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Patrick’s Story

Site created on September 7, 2017

Welcome to our CaringBridge site. We've created it to keep friends and family updated. We appreciate your support and words of hope during this time when it matters most.

Original Story 09/07/2017: On August 28th, Pat was driving with Alyssa in the passenger seat, when he had a seizure while stopped at a stoplight. He refused to go to the ER that night due to the first day of school being the next day. After his first day of teaching at his new job, Alyssa brought Pat to the ER. There they heard the words no one wants to hear: “you have a large mass on the left side of your brain.” Two weeks later, Pat had surgery to remove the brain tumor. The surgery went as expected, and the surgeon was able to remove 90-95% of the tumor. They determined it is a stage 2 tumor. Pat was transferred to the ICU after surgery. He then had a grand mal seizure and needed to be intubated again, as he was having trouble breathing on his own. He initially did not speak after waking up from surgery. After spending 11 days in the hospital, Pat completed intensive speech, OT, and PT in an inpatient rehab setting for 12 days. He completed radiation at the end of December, and was scheduled to complete chemo about a month later. He however was unable to tolerate chemo - he lost 14 lbs in 1 week due to feeling so sick. Pat continues to work with speech therapy and occupational therapy 2x per week. It has been a long road but he is a fighter!

12/08/2023 Update: As many of you know, Patrick had a 7cm tumor removed from his left frontal/temporal lobes of his brain in September 2017. Dr. Jackson wasn’t able to remove all of the tumor at that time due to risk of causing further damage (stroke or further brain injury). He still has 5-10% of that original tumor left in his brain. We have been diligently following up with his oncologist every 6 months to make sure the tumor hasn’t been growing or changing. We’ve had a few hiccups along the way the past 6 years, but the tumor has never changed. Until October 12, 2023. We went in for our follow up scan and excitedly told the nurse and oncologist about the arrival of our first baby in March. After being excited for us, Dr. Almquist became serious and told us that there was a flair on the MRI. This indicated that the tumor has grown slightly. We had a more detailed follow up scan on November 27, 2023 which confirmed that the tumor is in fact slowly growing (now about 1.5 cm). Pat has not had any new symptoms at this point - he always gets fatigued when he does too much and gets headaches often. We met with Dr. Jackson on December 6, who recommended surgery to remove to tumor. Since this isn’t emergent, but definitely needs to be taken care of before the baby arrives, surgery was scheduled for January 5th. We are processing the unknowns and what life may look like for us going forward (Pat is processing it better than his mother and I). We are ok for now, but may need more support after surgery as Pat recovers. Thanks for your continued love & support over the past 6 years.

Newest Update

Journal entry by Alyssa Anderson — Apr 1, 2024

Pat has had some improvements and attended a few appointments since I last updated a month ago. He met with neurology and neurosurgery. Both went well! He hasn’t had any seizures, and the pseudomeningocele (swelling in his head) has decreased. We are still waiting for approval for the IDH inhibitor drug.

Pat has a little more energy and expression in his face now. His speech has improved a bit, and he’s now able to put together small sentences. He’s still incredibly frustrated. It’s difficult for him to follow directions or identify objects due to his language deficits, but he’s more aware of it now and tries to understand by asking questions. He still isn’t able to help a ton with Zeke like he wants to, but he’s been practicing reading books to him. Since Pat is feeling better, we were able to travel to his parents’ house for Easter. It was great for us to get out of town and do something “normal!”

Zeke is 1 month old today, and we both can’t believe how fast time is flying with him. He’s been a good baby for us! As always, thank you to everyone for the thoughts, prayers, check ins, food, and gifts. We are so lucky to have great people in our lives. Hopefully we continue to push forward without setbacks.

Read More of the journal titled "Follow up appointments"

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