For years, many of you have been praying for a very special little man, Denny. I've never even met this little man, but he was blessed to be born into an extraordinary family, and every day my babies and I pray for Denny and his family.
My heart was so broken that it took me an entire day to share this post from his mom, but I share it now to ask for your prayers. Prayers for miraculous healing for Denny, and prayers for strength, comfort and peace for him and his entire family.
THE MOST RECENT POST FROM HIS ROCK STAR MOM:
Today the team told us that they don't have a curative treatment to offer at this time. We will be shifting our focus to enjoying Denny enjoying his life for whatever time that is.
We will be giving Denny angiogenesis inhibitors - this blocks blood vessels which would give the tumors the blood that they need to grow. The goal is to stabilize the tumors. As an example, they have a child that's been on them for 8 months and is still running around playing basketball. We would love to see Denny feel great for that long.
Other things that we'll be doing to help Denny feel super awesome are to take out his drain in the morning and generally reduce the time he spends at the hospital wherever we can. (We head back to Raleigh tomorrow afternoon.)
Of course, no one knows exactly how everything will unfold. But they explained to us that generally what happens is that Denny will continue to feel like his general little badass self and then he'll start to experience some pain as the tumor grows - and we'll be ready for that. Our focus will shift completely to managing the pain.....but all that is hopefully months from now.
My sister asked me today if we were on the same page that the next few months should basically be a "make a wish lifestyle". YES!!!!! That's exactly what I have in mind. There will come a day when we're sitting in our house staring at Denny - but that is not where we are yet. Sometimes making Denny happy is going to be things like going to school and learning his letters - I still want him to feel accomplished. And sometimes, it's going to be us flying to Disney World. (And going to see Annie at the DPAC, Annie is touring in Boston right now and Denny's desire to go see this is kinda ridiculous.)
This is going to be a very confusing time period for all of us and I don't expect us to get this perfectly or know exactly what to do. I would like to ask you to be cognizant of what you say in front of your children as you're processing all this. One of Denny's greatest joys is to get to be around classmates and Darian's friends - and he is very much full of life right now.
And again, I know you're wondering. "But really, are you guys ok?" "Is the rest of the family ok?" We are all either ok or will be ok. We adore Denny and don't want his sweet little spirit to leave us. But, I think that we all feel capable of moving on from that feeling and enjoying our many more moments together.
We will be giving Denny angiogenesis inhibitors - this blocks blood vessels which would give the tumors the blood that they need to grow. The goal is to stabilize the tumors. As an example, they have a child that's been on them for 8 months and is still running around playing basketball. We would love to see Denny feel great for that long.
Other things that we'll be doing to help Denny feel super awesome are to take out his drain in the morning and generally reduce the time he spends at the hospital wherever we can. (We head back to Raleigh tomorrow afternoon.)
Of course, no one knows exactly how everything will unfold. But they explained to us that generally what happens is that Denny will continue to feel like his general little badass self and then he'll start to experience some pain as the tumor grows - and we'll be ready for that. Our focus will shift completely to managing the pain.....but all that is hopefully months from now.
My sister asked me today if we were on the same page that the next few months should basically be a "make a wish lifestyle". YES!!!!! That's exactly what I have in mind. There will come a day when we're sitting in our house staring at Denny - but that is not where we are yet. Sometimes making Denny happy is going to be things like going to school and learning his letters - I still want him to feel accomplished. And sometimes, it's going to be us flying to Disney World. (And going to see Annie at the DPAC, Annie is touring in Boston right now and Denny's desire to go see this is kinda ridiculous.)
This is going to be a very confusing time period for all of us and I don't expect us to get this perfectly or know exactly what to do. I would like to ask you to be cognizant of what you say in front of your children as you're processing all this. One of Denny's greatest joys is to get to be around classmates and Darian's friends - and he is very much full of life right now.
And again, I know you're wondering. "But really, are you guys ok?" "Is the rest of the family ok?" We are all either ok or will be ok. We adore Denny and don't want his sweet little spirit to leave us. But, I think that we all feel capable of moving on from that feeling and enjoying our many more moments together.
END OF MANDY'S POST. BEGINNING OF MINE...
And in addition to your prayers, I have another request, if you feel so incredibly blessed this Thanksgiving season, please consider giving back.... to Denny, and to his family.
BEGINNING OF WENDY'S POST...
This is Wendy, Mandy's sister. Thank you all so much for the kind emails, texts, Facebook messages, banners, balloons, and gifts you've all been organizing after Mandy's post last night. We are all feeling very loved and supported by Team Denny!
The most common thing we are being asked is some form of "how can I help facilitate this make a wish lifestyle?" In response to that, we have set up this funding page:
https://www.giveforward.com/fundraiser/gzl6/team-denny
https://www.giveforward.com/fundraiser/gzl6/team-denny
Mandy and Doug can use the money to do anything our little man chooses to request. We know some days that will be eating a bunch of M & M's and some days that will be vacations, but this will leave them some flexibility either way.
Thank you again for everything you've done to support our family. You are all absolutely amazing.
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