Just spoke to Dr. Hecht

He just finished the proceedure we spoke about. They were able to run the cathader in to Lynne's brain and inject the chemicals just as they did before. The spasms are very bad on the smaller branches of her arteries, reducing the vessels to just threads. These chemicals are not any sort of long term fix...they are only temporary. The hope is that they'll relax the arteries and stop the strokes. She did have a seizure while he was doing the procedure--it was mild and is typical when working with the brain as they are.

Dr. Hecht said that while he has seen patients recover from this place to a funtional, independant life, he'd be lying if he didn't tell us he was very concerned and he encouraged us to pray. Lynne has taken a turn for the worse since Monday with the vaso spasms. They are causing strokes in what Dr. Hecht called the "high rent" real estate of the brain--the areas that control speaking and motor skills. He said that if we cannot keep strokes from happening there then Lynne could become a vegetable or pass away.

Right now she's back in her room resting and sedated. He left the catheder in her leg so they can do the procedure quickly in the next few days if they need to. We asked about the 4,7,10,12 day timeline of the spasms, and how we should, in theory, be seeing the end of them soon. He sort of sighed and said that there were no hard and fast rules for that timeline--that those mile markers were only general trends. Lynne's seem to be running much more severe than average. There's no way to predict that, it's just how it is. He said that if we can make it through the next three days without any more strokes then that would be good.

I don't really know what to say. We all feel so helpless, and like every time we have something to be encouraged about we end up getting kicked in the teeth. We're all really scared right now. Dave and Peggy Green just got here to stay with Chuck. I don't know how long they'll be here, but Leigh and I are glad to see them. Please pray for Lynne, Chuck, Leigh, Joe, Andy, John and Mommom and everyone else in the family. We're all pretty scared right now.