Here's something I meant to post--Dawn in hospital

[Guest guest]

Dear friends and family,

I apologize to those of you who have been expecting to hear from me

lately, but Dawn has been having a rough few days, which is what I

wanted to let you know about.

Late Tuesday night Dawn began to have severe abdominal pains and was

vomiting blood. (This was after about a week of similar but milder

pain associated with her Crohn's disease.) Her GI specialist told her

to go to the ER to be checked for any perforations or anything like

that, so I took her to the hospital. X-rays and lab work showed

nothing abnormal other than her Crohn's disease, so the ER doctor

figured this was just a flare-up of those symptoms. But since Dawn's

pain was uncontrollable, she was kept overnight. (I got home around

3:30am.)

On Wednesday a CT scan was done, which showed nothing. But Dawn's GI

doctor was concerned about some of the lab work, so he ordered a

colonoscopy.

The colonoscopy was done Thursday. Her GI doctor has concluded that

Dawn has pancreatitis in addition to the Crohn's but that the

pancreatitis is probably a side effect of medication. The medication

in question is her headache medication. Her doctor wants to get her

off this and some other things that were treating the Crohn's for a

while. Unfortunately, as far as Dawn's migraines are concerned, she

is on the only medication that has brought her some long-term

reduction in symptoms (Depakote). We know from past experience that

getting off the Depakote will probably mean an increase in the

severity of the headaches. No other medications have ever helped her

consistently in the past. However, if the doctor is correct, staying

on Depakote will keep the pancreatitis going, which could

theoretically be fatal (which I'm not sure would necessarily bother

Dawn after living in chronic pain for so long).

Dawn will not be coming home today (Friday). She has been taken off

food so that her pancreas can be checked. She has also been taken off

her Depakote (the migraine medication) and the Pentasa which she has

been using for Crohn's. This is likely to have a harsh impact on her

because normally you are not supposed to stop Depakote so drastically.

Once the pancreatitis is reevaluated, doctors will figure out what to

do next (hopefully). But as of now she definitely will not be coming

home from the hospital until at least Saturday.

Thanks again for your thoughts and prayers.