so many of You have been so kind to me over the years and i appreciate it immensely. i met the best people here, just talking about my kids. many of You know about my son Andrew's battle with cystic fibrosis and are praying for him. thank you so very much. the past few weeks have been very rough. i only post this because many of You have asked how Andrew is doing and i thought this was the easiest way to explain the latest chapter. thank You for Your indulgence:

at about 8 o'clock on sunday morning, the unit woke up and saw Andrew's light on. he opened the door and found Andrew on the floor on his back, unconscious. stuff in Andrew's room was knocked down and scattered on the floor. the unit called an ambulance and then he called me. i went flying down the street in my pajama bottoms. one of the EMTs said that Andrew was seizing. i rode with him to Credit Valley Hospital, where they moved him into the Resuscitation Room. his jaws were locked in seizure and so he was given a muscle relaxant so that he could be intubated. the ER doctor said that Andrew wouldn't have lasted without this measure. i called the unit and he called Andrew's egg donor before heading to the hospital. at that point, Andrew was being moved to intensive care. CT scan again was normal. the egg donor, her wife, Mrs. egg donor, the unit and i went in to see Andrew together. he was no longer seizing at that point. he had not been sedated, so it was crucial that he wake up {fear of coma}.
at some point, he did begin to regain consciousness, but he immediately tried to remove the breathing tube, so he was lightly sedated.
alex and i went to see him last evening and he was awake!. he'd been taken off the ventilator at 5, but he had some god awful honkin' IV sticking out of his neck. he wanted a drink, so the nurse brought him some ice chips, which he handled well. i got him to sit up so that i could scratch his back for him. he always loved that, from the time he was a little boy, was always very tactile. i avoided the scratches that must have occurred when he fell. then i massaged his back and his shoulders with lotion and massaged the back of his head and his temples. his egg donor came in and the nurse removed the IV in Andrew's neck.
i was a wreck at work this morning, so i just put my mail up and went to the hospital. Andrew was understandably very cranky, just wanting to go home. i brought him a drink from Booster Juice. he likes "Mango Hurricane" and "Berry Berry". the unit showed up. finally, so did the ICU doc. an acceptable level of ammonia in the body is 40. Andrew's was 300. according to the unit, St. Mike's can't explain why Andrew had the severe mental confusion the last time he went to Emerge there, and the doctor at Credit Valley can't explain why Andrew was seizing on sunday morning, but.....hepatic encephalopathy {which means that the liver's malfuntioning is affecting the brain}, which can cause mental confusion, seizure and coma, is a result of liver failure. anyway, it's complicated, and i'm just a delivery boy. the Credit Valley doc thought that perhaps these two episodes of hepatic encephalopathy might move Andrew higher up the list for a liver. still waiting for a meeting with the transplant team.
the unit and i went to his place to gather up things that Andrew wanted and then Andrew called, saying he was being moved to St. Mike's.
and i guess that's it for now.