Catching Up...

So, it’s been a while – how y’all doing??? :)

Sometimes life gets in the way of the good ‘ol blog, but we’ll see what we can do to bring you up to speed…

Since the last post Brayden celebrated his 1st Birthday. I’ll try to get some pics of that up as we had 2 celebrations – 1 in Palestine with Kel’s parents and the other in Addison at Kelli’s Cousin’s house (Lucy D.). We loved being able to spend time with all our family and the fellowship with others we were able to experience was so heartwarming and fulfilling. We have been blessed with tremendous friends and family.

We still haven’t had Brayden’s MRI that got rescheduled for a later date due to the discovery of HCV RNA in his blood (Hepatitis C). We are going to have him re-tested to find out the “viral load” of the Hep C to see how much of it is in his system somewhere around March. This will give us a better knowledge of what we’re looking at as he gets older – treatments, warning signs, eating habits, etc. He’s had an eye appt since our last blog, and it came back GREAT!! At the last eye appt the Doc mentioned he may need to have glasses when he goes to school, but it appears that may not be the case as of this most recent appt. So, we’ll see and pray that glasses would be one inconvenience he can avoid. He’s also seen a holistic doctor to help us with some good things to get Brayden to combat and hold off the Hep C. That Doctor was VERY IMPRESSED with our “25 weeker.” Kel mentioned that when he walked into the room he saw Brayden and his jaw dropped and he just wanted to hold him and love on him – he just couldn’t believe B was doing so well. He gave some advice for us to get B “creeping” – hands and knees crawling, and he’s referred us to a Private PT to get us another opinion to go with our ECI therapist(s) that come every month. This new therapist he’s referred us to is a Therapist who specializes in brain injured children…so we’re hoping they can help us with B’s brain injury and the repercussions.

Kelli’s dad, Andrew, was diagnosed with Cancer (Melanoma) since the last time we blogged. He underwent 2 surgeries to take out over 70 lymph nodes to try to remove all the cancer and avoid treatments. It was a pretty aggressive way to do it, but it was SUCCESSFUL!!! We got a report yesterday that the results came back showing no cancer in the 66 lymph nodes they took out at his last surgery. WOO HOO!!!! So very thankful for Jesus who watched over Andrew and Patricia thru that whole process and for allowing the Doctor’s to know the right procedure to clear this cancer. The “C” word is always very scary and the Dowdney/Overton clans have defeated it TWICE!!!! (Kel had Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma when we lived in College Station).

Otherwise, we’ve just been living life and taking care of Bray J. He is such a great baby and has so much personality. He loves to laugh and is very ticklish. He does really well standing at his table that he can play music on, poke buttons, and light up lights. He is crawling, but doesn’t use his right leg as well as his left, so we are continually working on that, and he doesn’t like to “creep” – the hands and knees crawling I mentioned before. These are crucial stepping stones he needs to master before he moves to walking. We know he has a little more time as he’s technically only 11 months old, but we want to do the right things and get him on track.

Thanks for stopping by, and hopefully we can update more often to keep you coming back!
D