On November 12, 2014 they welcomed their baby boy Lincoln into the world. Amy and Tavis found out about his pregnancy on March 7, 2014 at Yakima Uriology while investigating kidney stones. This is where Amy's medical journey began.
In early September 2014, Amy woke up in the middle of the night with a CRAZY back pain that felt like it was paralyzing her entire mid-section. It lasted about 10 minutes but Tavis was able to rub it out, and they chalked it up as a pinched nerve or a muscle spasm. She asked the OB Doctor about it and she suspected the same thing. By the end of pregnancy she was having these little episodes about once or twice a week. Labor and delivery went great and they figured not carrying a watermelon around her mid-section anymore would fix the problem.
The week of Thanksgiving (two weeks after child birth) the episodes came back stronger, more frequent, and consistently in the evening right before bed. Usually a two hour regimen of Advil, massage, and hot/cold therapy would do the trick. On December 5, 2014, however, Amy went to the ER for the first time in her life because the pain was too much to manage. It felt like it started in her back, around the bra strap, and paralyzed her mid-section like a contraction with no mercy. Pain level was about a "9", which was saying a lot since she had just given birth and could easily remember what labor contractions felt like (her pain tolerance was pretty high, actually). They gave her Vicodin and said its most likely a muscle spasm because of the rapid body changes she had just experienced and was experiencing with breast feeding. Amy actually didn't take the Vicodin because she didn't want it to transfer over to her breast milk. She waited until the pain past but held on to the medication just in case of another flare up. She was really sore from the strain, but no major pain attacks for exactly one week.
On December 12, 2014 it came back again with vengeance! Taking 2 Vicodin and 3 Ibeuprofen didn't touch it, so they checked into the ER again, this time they gave her Valium there on the spot and said similar diagnosis, sent them home. At 9am Amy woke up and felt like she couldn't move, literally. Tavis had to bring her a bucket to puke there on the spot from the pain. Her mom took her to the chiropractor for an early morning adjustment. Didn't do much... the pain seemed unbearable, nothing could touch it. Puking wouldn't stop, body felt paralyzed. Tavis says, "I knew Amy was serious when she said 'call an ambulance' because she is cheap and she would never ever want to pay for that. Tavis carried her down to the car and they made it to the hospital, puking and screaming all the way. Amy's eyes started to roll back from the pain and seemed moments away from passing out. After lots of SCREAMING and HELP ME's coming out of Amy's mouth, they did not get any pain under control but did give her a CT scan which diagnosed a disease called Pancreatitis. They admitted her into the hospital on the morning of Saturday, December 13th with a minimum 3 day hospital stay expectation.
After many tests and scans, it was determined a week later that she also has Pancreatic Necrosis (part of the pancreas has died). There is a LOT of inflammation, fluid and pain. Recovery includes a feeding tube and managing her pain while waiting for inflammation to go down. In the future her gallbladder will also need to be removed but that date is unknown. Her hospital release date is still unknown.
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