Caden’s Page

I asked God over and over this past week to take MingMa if he was not going to heal her. Today God answered my prayer. I am so thankful that God did not leave MingMa to suffer. I am thankful that I got to see her one last time and tell her that I loved her.

Please keep the Osborne family in your prayers this week as we all morn our loss and rejoice in God’s gain. MingMa (Edna Osborne) was my father’s mother. She raised five wonderful children including my father, his two brothers, and his two sisters. She is survived by several siblings, four children, and a long list of grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Today was a special day for Caden. He got his first official haircut this evening. Caden seemed to enjoy all of the attention. Check out the pictures below to get a look at this cool kid. You can click the images to get a closer look at each one.

Thanks for checking on Caden today. You can read about our weekend trip to the upstate in the previous post below.

We took a trip to my hometown of Clinton, SC this weekend. Our primary reason for the visit was to see my grandmother (MingMa) who had spent most oft he past two weeks in the hospital. MingMa is my only living grandparent. She is also Caden and Riley’s only living great-grandparent.

Ming’s stay in the hospital ended with a disturbing diagnosis from the doctors. She has been diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer. The diagnosis was confirmed earlier this week and the doctors have basically told her that there is nothing they can do for this type of cancer.

The really cool thing about all this was that MingMa had the most awesome attitude a person could possibly have in her situation. She had to get a little surgical procedure this week and she told me, “I was not scared at all.” I said, “You know why?” She just shook her head with a yes. I continued and told her that she was not scared because she has Jesus. I reminded her how God has healed Caden and how faith in God is all you have to stand on sometimes with these medical concerns. I told her that we are praying every night for healing and comfort for her.

My uncle will be staying with her for as long as needed. He is double retired from the military as well as civil service. He would be there even if he was not retired though.

The other cool thing about the visit with Ming was that I got to remind her that I would likely not have God in my life today if it were not for her. I am told that she started taking me to church when I was not even crawling. She made sure I got to Sunday school every week for 14 years except for the Sunday I spent in the hospital when getting my tonsils taken out. How can I possibly remember that? Well, I have a 9 year perfect attendance pin from Calvary Baptist Church in Clinton, SC to help remind me. It would have been closer to 14 years perfect attendance, but they made me start over after missing that one Sunday when I was five years old.

Ming told me that she was very proud of how I have turned out. I told her that she would probably be even more proud if she could follow me around for a few days and see that I am truly trying to live a good Christian life. She can be proud of herself for setting an example for me, her children and many other grandchildren.

On a sad note, our trip came with the loss of one of my sister’s cats “Foots”. Foots and Trouble were our cats until about two years ago when Riley tested as allergic to cats. Foots was picked out from the SPCA not long after we moved into this house. He was to keep Trouble company while Sherry and I worked. Foots was also called “G-man” because spent about $1000 nursing him to health after bringing him home from the pound back in 2001. He got so sick that he spent some time in an oxygen tent on an IV in the animal hospital. My sister took him in for an autopsy because he was an inside cat along with Trouble and two others. She wanted to make sure that Foots did not die of something that might affect the other cats. The autopsy showed that Foots died of a heart attack due to a defect. This of course has no affect on other cats in the house.

There is still more news on Caden but it has nothing to do with our trip to Clinton. I will write more about that later. In the meantime, let me just say praise God for botox. We are back to full nights of sleep without suctioning Caden at all.

Caden did go in for his botox this morning. He was home before noon and was back to normal activity within no time. The doctor ended up giving Caden about four times the amount of any previous dose of botox. We will keep you posted on how well this does works. It can take up to 72 hours for the botox to take affect.

Caden’s swallowing ability still has room for improvement. He is still completely dependant on his g-tube for nutrition. While the picture below of Caden tasting a sucker during therapy and the birthday cake photos look like he is putting down the food, they do not show how it ends up coming out his nose a few minutes later.

We believe that we have two things that we need to work on with Caden’s swallowing. One is the skills required to swallow. This item is being addressed with therapy several times per week now and will be addressed more with a trip to St. Joseph’s Children’s Hospital, The Center for Pediatric Feeding & Swallowing Disorders located in Paterson, NJ sometime in the near future. Our recent visit to the Greenwood Genetic Center (GGC) confirmed that the Center for Pediatric Feeding and Swallowing Disorders is likely the best place for us to take Caden to get the latest information on how to move forward with Caden’s swallowing skills. The GGC has agreed to assist us with getting into the swallowing center in a timely manner. We have been gathering data for the swallowing center and will be sending that information this week. (i.e., copies of swallow studies, video of Caden eating, video of him playing, etc) The second big item we need to work on concerning Caden’s swallowing is his physical capacity for swallowing. His upper digestive track has worked better in the past after a botox injection to the upper sphincter of the esophagus (AES) and we have been shown no other suitable alternative to help his swallowing capacity.

Recently Caden has required more suctioning of secretions. His ability to pass food has not shown remarkable improvements recently either. These things prompted us to meet with Caden’s ENT (Ear, nose, and Throat) doctor. As a result we have scheduled Caden for another botox injection of the upper esophagus on Monday. This will be his third treatment in four months. The first treatment was done in August and resulted in Caden passing a swallow study for the first time ever. After recent discussions with the ENT we believe that this dose of botox will be the largest yet. The doctors say that they can not predict exactly how much will be used because they determine tat during the procedure. Please keep Caden in your prayers especially on Monday morning beginning at 7am. Even though this will be an outpatient procedure, he will receive anesthesia. We will be at the MUSC Rutledge Tower outpaitent area for this procedure.

Caden does something new every day or two that makes us laugh out loud. The picture below was taken a couple of nights ago at the dinner table. Caden scooted himself down while chewing on his strap. He then proceeded to reach up with his toes and play with his hair. He did not use his hands at all to pull his foot up to his head. Another recent funny action was when Caden used his chin to beep the horn on the steering wheel that is clamped to the swing. He would beep it and then wait until we looked and just start laughing at us and then do it again. God has definitely blessed this child with a sense of humor.

Big Brother Riley

You can see pictures and read about Riley’s fun day of flying by going to the Big Brother Riley blog.

Local News

The Lowcountry Christian Community School will be holding information meetings beginning this week. If you are looking for a school for your children in the Charleston area that is built on biblical values and strives to equip your children to serve God then you must check out the Lowcountry Christian Community School.

Our family and many friends know that we plan to home school our children. I can honestly say that the Lowcountry Christian Community School is the ONLY education option for our children in the Charleston area outside of home schooling. I encourage you to attend one of the upcoming information meetings to hear what Sherry and I have learned about this school. We are fortunate enough to know the organizers very well. All of the organizers have been very involved in our lives over the past couple of years and especially in this past year. They have been there for us in so many ways including prayer, unconditional love, and friendship.

Sherry has actually been able to witness some of their planning for this school over the past year. I can not stress how important it is that you go and hear for yourself what a blessing the Lowcountry Christian Community School is going to be to this area. The first meeting is Monday night November 14, 2005 and we hope to see you there. Click on the image below for more information including locations, dates, and times for the meetings.

Holiday

I hope you all had a great Veteran’s Day. Please don’t forget those who volunteer to risk their lives to make sure we have the freedom that we enjoy in this country. The biggest freedom that we have is to be able to worship God when, where and how we want without fear of being jailed by our government. Find a veteran or an active member of the military this weekend and just say thanks by giving them a big hug.

God has blessed us with a wonderful year. I won’t say much today. I will let the pictures tell the story. Here are a couple of good pictures from the selection that I have posted on Caden’s Picture Pages.

Caden is one year old today. God has blessed us with this little boy. Please join us in wishing Caden a wonderful and happy birthday.

Click the linck below to see a little video clip from last night showing you just how much Caden has grown. It’s big (57mb) and low resolution, but it is good. I hope you enjoy.

Video of Caden and Riley Playing Please forgive the moving camera. I hope you don’t get dizzy.

Happy Birthday Caden!!!

Please remember to call or email us if you plan to join us on Saturday for the celebration of the success that Caden has seen though God’s love and grace.

All friends, family, and prayer warriors for Caden are invited to celebrate a wonderful year of miracles. Please join us at our house on Saturday, November 5, 2005 from 11:30am to 1:00pm. We are going to grill hotdogs and burgers.

I made a couple of mistakes in the last posting. I used a half ounce in place of a half teaspoon. That is 15ml verses 2.5ml which is what I meant to say. Caden is still taking only about 2.5ml of food by mouth over a 30-45 minute period. I also made a mistake in saying he is getting five feedings when in fact his is only getting four feedings via g-tube. I apologize for the confusion.

We had to take Caden in to the doctor Friday due to some severe congestion and cough. Caden had a really rough time getting to sleep last night. Sherry and Riley have had a little bit of cold symptoms over the past week and Caden seems to have picked it up. The doctor said that there were no signs of fever and that his lungs sounded great. We just need to let this run its course. He did give Caden some cold medicine and gave us a few tips on how to help the cold clear up. Other than that he is going to be fine.

We had our 40-days of Community group meeting here Friday tonight and the doctor gave us the all clear for having folks over. He said that there is not much danger of Caden giving this to anyone at this point especially since folks don’t get in his face. He was more worried about Caden getting something from someone else, but we mitigated that by going ahead and putting Caden in bed before folks arrived.

Riley is doing much better with ther exception of having a cold this week. He passed his 3 year old check up with flying colors this week. He is a little small for his age, but the doctor says not to worry about that. The doctor says that Riley is healthy and smart and that the growth will come.

We have decided to go forward with another botox treatment for Caden’s swallowing. As stated in my last post (after the correction), Caden is about at the same point as he was a month ago with swallowing. We have been suctioning a ton more this week due to the congestion, but Caden has been requiring just a little more suctioning day by day over the past several weeks. We have made the appointment for the 14th of November to get the next botox treatment done. It will be outpatient again just like the one done almost two months ago.

Thanks for your prayers. Sherry received a few calls from folks excited to hear about Caden’s progress earlier this week. I did mean to let you know that his physical and occupation therapy is moving along good. I do apologize for the mistakes on the feeding and swallowing.

Big brother Riley will be three years old on Tuesday. Caden and the rest of our family celebrated Riley’s birthday over the weekend at Chuck-E-Cheese. I am not sure who had more fun between Riley, Caden, and me. Cousin Kurt and many other party goers helped Riley collect and cash in over 1000 prize tickets from the games at the end of the day.

Speaking of birthdays we have another big birthday fast approaching. Caden will celebrate his first birthday in just a few weeks. We plan to celebrate Caden’s birthday privately as a family. That said a year of blessings and showers of God’s grace will not go unrecognized here at the Osborne house.

All friends, family, and prayer warriors for Caden are invited to celebrate a wonderful year of miracles. Please join us at our house on Saturday, November 5, 2005 from 11:30am to 1:00pm. We are going to grill hotdogs and burgers. Bring your empty belly along with a Coke, side dish, and/or dessert. Please RSVP via email or phone no later than 10/30/05 if you plan to attend. Once again, this is not a birthday party. It is a day of celebration of the things that God has done in our lives over the past year.

Greenwood Genetic Center

We took Caden to the Greenwood Genetic Center last week. We spent several hours answering questions and discussing issues related to Caden’s health conditions. The doctor is assessing all of the information that he gathered on Caden and our family and he plans to send us a letter in the next few weeks summarizing his observations and recommendations for future tests and treatments that we should consider. We will keep you posted on the results of his findings.

Caden’s Progress

Caden is doing well with his physical therapy in particular. He is sitting up for extended lengths of time each day. He is becoming more interactive when we play with him. His progress with eating by mouth is slow, but improving. He continues to sample different flavors, but can only swallow approximately a half a teaspoon of food in a 30-45 minute period. He still gets tube feedings of special order formula four times per day. He does still require suctioning several times per day. Praise God, he sleeps through the night for 10-12 hours without needing any suctioning at all on most nights.

Thoughts

It is amazing how the smallest of people can lead you to your biggest lessons in life. I will forever be thankful to God for the journey that I have been on for the past year with Caden and our family. I can not believe it has only been a year because I have collected a lifetime of experiences.

Oh yeah, don’t forget to check out the latest pictures HERE.