Lori Hendrix-Moye

Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated on my mom's condition.  We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement during this time.  Her story starts on Saturday, September 29th when she went to Wellstar Paulding for shortness of breathe and the feeling of something sitting on her chest.  She was admitted for what we thought was acute congestive heart failure and pneumonia.  On Sunday, October 1st she was moved up to Paulding's ICU unit due to the amount of oxygen she was requiring.  After 10 days in the ICU unit at Wellstar Paulding her pulmonologist recommend she be moved to Wellstar Kennestone.  While at Kennestone the doctors there diagnosed her with Pulmonary Fibrosis caused by silent re-flux and would need a double lung transplant.  Doctors were going to consultant with Emory to see if she could be transferred there for an evaluation.    At 1AM on Thursday, October 12th we received the call that  she went into respiratory distress and and was placed on a ventilator.  At that point, transferring her to Emory for the evaluation was off the table.  On Friday, October 13th, two doctors consulted and placed a call to UAB in Birmingham to see if they would evaluate for transplant while on the ventilator.  At 5:50pm she was picked up via ambulance and driven to Cobb County International Airport in Kennesaw, GA and was placed on a medical jet and flown to UAB Hospital.  Once at UAB doctors started a series of test and evaluations and they have determined that she has Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) and not Pulmonary Fibrosis.  They also said that yes there is some scaring on her lungs but not to the extent of needing a double lung transplant.  They said that 70% of patients with this condition survive but there is still that other 30%.  She is currently "paralyzed" so that the machine is doing all the work.  With ARDS, steroids will not treat the inflammation but that she needs time to heal.  At this time we are feeling hopeful that she will get through this and that we will have some amazing stories to tell her.  As many of you know my father is the final stages of Alzheimer and is currently at home in hospice care.  Me, my brother Kevin and his family and Haley are trying to juggle time between each parent.  We have been on an emotional roller coaster ride over the last 15 days so please continue to pray for my mom and our family.  Waiting for her to return home is her husband Earl (who even though he cannot talk he misses her terribly), her son Kevin and wife Jennifer, me and my husband Kevin, her great niece Haley, four beautiful grandchildren (Madison 15, Anderson 11, Megan 10 and Andrew 4), her animals Mia and Snowflake and other family and friends.


Updates on the page will be made my me (her daughter) or my mom's sister Anita Woodward.  We all want to thank everyone for their calls and messages and apologize if we do not respond right away.


Sincerely,


Jennifer Armstrong