Kelsie Lundmark Optimism=Achievement

Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated in one place. We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement. Thank you for visiting.


A favorite quote of mine reads, "Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence." My family has had to have a lot of faith, hope, and confidence in the recent months and we continue to hold fast in the months to come. I have had migraines my entire life but when I had my son last July they became a monster unlike anything I've ever known. I became someone I no longer recognized and suffered daily from debilitating pain. I finally mentioned it to my midwife thinking it had something to do with my son's birth. She thankfully ruled that out as a possibility and referred me to a local neurologist. Initially they thought the migraines to be attributed to stressors in my life that were multiplied by having an infant. They ordered an MRI just to be sure and put me on medications to help with the stress and lack of sleep. The MRI results came back and they had found 2 lesions on my brain sitting on the cortex that controls the motor function on the left side of my body. They called with the results as I was on the way to the grocery store with my son and that feeling of "this happens to other people but not to me" hit me like a brick. I was immediately admitted to the hospital where they ran countless tests and did everything in their power to figure out what the lesions were. Words like MS, cancer, tumor, and biopsy were thrown around that weekend I stayed in the hospital. I was discharged with no more answers than I had going in except that my CSF (cerebral spinal fluid) came back negative for MS. Since being in the hospital I have had a trip to the ER for a seizure that they are now managing with medications.


When I was discharged they scheduled a follow up with a neurosurgeon, here in Minot, that told me that where the lesions were was too dangerous for anyone in Minot to biopsy because they don't have the proper imaging equipment. They didn't feel comfortable doing it here so they referred me to Mayo clinic in Rochester, MN. We made an appointment and last second couldn't afford to go but we have rescheduled for early March and have everything in place.  We are anxiously awaiting our trip to Rochester and the answers that we hope to find there.


We are so grateful for all the work that the doctors and nurses have put in to try to find answers for our family. We are very thankful for the Minot Lions Club for donating money to help us with the trip. And we are so appreciative to our friends and family that have kept us in their thoughts, and we will be using this site to keep everyone up to date on what is happening as we have a lot of family from out of state. Unlimited thanks for all the thoughts and warm wishes from everyone!