Hello. My name is Lisa Buck. I am the very proud mother of 17-year-old Ashlee Buck, my beautiful daughter. I am raising money for medical expenses for my daughter. Ashlee will be having brain surgery October 19, 2015. For the past several years Ashlee has been struggling with multiple issues ranging from surgeries on both her feet to stomach issues to migraines. Her issues with her feet were not a huge issue but were an ordeal in the sense that Ashlee had surgery in Oct. 2013 on one foot and then in Feb. 2014 on the opposite foot. She recovered well from both of those surgeries, but she has constantly had issues with headaches, nausea, and vomiting.
We tried multiple medicine modalities to help with the headaches and the nausea, which for a little while helped, but her symtpoms progressed over time. When no medication could help with the nausea and vomiting any longer, I pushed to have her seen by a pediatric gastroeneterologist. We do not have any pediatric specialists in the town in which we live, so we traveled an hour and a half one way to the closest city to have her seen. She soon thereafter had an EGD at the hospital out of town and they found nothing that would cause her symptoms, yet advised to leave her on a proton pump inhibitor to help just in case and followup if symptoms persisted.
Her symptoms did persist and her headaches worsened to the point again where over-the-counter migraine medications were not helping at all. By this time months have passed and her quality of life had changed drastically. She was no longer able to go to school every day or stay at school all day because of the headaches. She was becoming more and more depressed and she was having panic attacks. We followed up with psychiatry to try to get her help there and she was placed on medication and diagnosed with severe panic disorder and mild depression. It took several tries of finding the right medications that worked for her, but we eventually did.
All the while, Ashlee's headaches progressed, the nausea was worse, and she vomited almost every time she ate. She quit eating. She did not feel like going anywhere. She withdrew from her friends. She pretty much slept as much as she could (which was an hour or two here or there) and laid in her dark room the rest of the time. It was heartbreaking to see my baby go through this and not be able to "fix" it. We were told since I have a history of migraines she probably would too. I was told we needed to see a pediatric neurologist and go from there (again, out of town). I was beyond frustrated, scared and mad! I wanted a CT scan of her head before we did anything else. Something was not right, it just couldn't be. My pediatrician was awesome and got us a CT of the head that day.
Sitting at the hospital waiting for the radiologist to read the CT scan was unnerving. People were coming and going, phones were ringing and I can't remember where my mind was, but I will never forget the gut sick feeling I got when I was called to the window and told that my daughter's pediatrician was on the phone for me. He asked me if Ashlee had ever had a head trauma. "What?", I replied. He repeated himself, you know, a blow to head, car wreck and hit her head, anything as a infant/toddler, etc. No, no and no. I was racking my brain to try and think back 17 years of memories to anything that would be considered a "head trauma", then he snapped me back to reality when he told me that she had a cyst on the brain. He said it was fluid filled and appears to have been there most, if not all, of her life. He was sending us home to pack a bag and take her the very next morning 300 miles north to a pediatric neurosurgeon!
Her cyst was CSF filled, was 2 x 5 x 4 cm in size, and had been there long enough it had thinned the skull. But we are lucky; it is sitting on top of the brain and not inside the brain. We are lucky that it thinned the skull instead of shifting the brain midline. We are lucky that it is not pressing on any nerves. We are still very blessed.
The next few months were filled with many, many doctors' appointments back and forth from Albany to Macon to the pediatric neurologist that we did have to end up seeing because the neurosurgeon wanted to try medication first to see if the headaches could be controlled another way and to see if they were really migraines or created by the pressure of the cyst. We traveled back and forth from Albany to Atlanta and from Albany to Columbus. Ashlee has endured so much lab work that I cannot count. We have had CT scans and MRIs. We have gone through so much medication, I feel like I could have started a pharmacy because she would take it just long enough for them to realize it was not working and then she would be changed to something else (usually a combination of 3-6 medications at a time).
She has been a trooper and she has endured more than I can imagine most people could let alone a teen. I am so proud of her.
The final decision has been made to drain the brain cyst because nothing else has worked and by process of elimination this has to be the cause of her issues. We are relieved to be having this surgery, especially since she has started having dizzy spells and passed out a few weeks ago. We are looking forward to a life with no pain or little pain. She lives now with a pain scale of 7 on a scale of 0-10. We are looking forward to her laughing more often and being able to enjoy life. We are looking forward to her hopefully not having to take so much medication if any medication. We are looking forward to her having a quality of life again. We are looking forward to her being able to go to school again and have good grades (she was an A student but currently is home schooled and is not passing most of her classes due to this illness). We really have so much to look forward to and we are hopeful.
It is very humbling to ask for help, however many of our friends have asked if there is anything they can do for us and donations are truly what is needed at this time. We have already spent $12,000 plus in diagnostic testing, medications and doctors' visits with just her medical bills related to this illness (not her feet) and have been fortunate to be able to pay these but have exhausted all of our resources to do so (because we have paid for 2 prior foot surgeries before this). It is difficult enough as a parent to have the stress of a sick child weighing on your heart but the burden of medical debt compounded with that makes it very difficult to keep your positive/healing presence to be able to take care of your child the way you should. My family is also looking at lost wages for the time that I am not working to take care of her because I do not have paid time off with my job since I have not been with them for a year. Your support would mean a great deal to my husband, myself and my children. It would mean the difference in our peace of mind. We thank all of our friends and family and anyone else who so feels moved to help us in our time of need.
I will keep you all updated as to Ashlee's progress in the weeks to come.
Sincerely,
Lisa Buck and Family
We tried multiple medicine modalities to help with the headaches and the nausea, which for a little while helped, but her symtpoms progressed over time. When no medication could help with the nausea and vomiting any longer, I pushed to have her seen by a pediatric gastroeneterologist. We do not have any pediatric specialists in the town in which we live, so we traveled an hour and a half one way to the closest city to have her seen. She soon thereafter had an EGD at the hospital out of town and they found nothing that would cause her symptoms, yet advised to leave her on a proton pump inhibitor to help just in case and followup if symptoms persisted.
Her symptoms did persist and her headaches worsened to the point again where over-the-counter migraine medications were not helping at all. By this time months have passed and her quality of life had changed drastically. She was no longer able to go to school every day or stay at school all day because of the headaches. She was becoming more and more depressed and she was having panic attacks. We followed up with psychiatry to try to get her help there and she was placed on medication and diagnosed with severe panic disorder and mild depression. It took several tries of finding the right medications that worked for her, but we eventually did.
All the while, Ashlee's headaches progressed, the nausea was worse, and she vomited almost every time she ate. She quit eating. She did not feel like going anywhere. She withdrew from her friends. She pretty much slept as much as she could (which was an hour or two here or there) and laid in her dark room the rest of the time. It was heartbreaking to see my baby go through this and not be able to "fix" it. We were told since I have a history of migraines she probably would too. I was told we needed to see a pediatric neurologist and go from there (again, out of town). I was beyond frustrated, scared and mad! I wanted a CT scan of her head before we did anything else. Something was not right, it just couldn't be. My pediatrician was awesome and got us a CT of the head that day.
Sitting at the hospital waiting for the radiologist to read the CT scan was unnerving. People were coming and going, phones were ringing and I can't remember where my mind was, but I will never forget the gut sick feeling I got when I was called to the window and told that my daughter's pediatrician was on the phone for me. He asked me if Ashlee had ever had a head trauma. "What?", I replied. He repeated himself, you know, a blow to head, car wreck and hit her head, anything as a infant/toddler, etc. No, no and no. I was racking my brain to try and think back 17 years of memories to anything that would be considered a "head trauma", then he snapped me back to reality when he told me that she had a cyst on the brain. He said it was fluid filled and appears to have been there most, if not all, of her life. He was sending us home to pack a bag and take her the very next morning 300 miles north to a pediatric neurosurgeon!
Her cyst was CSF filled, was 2 x 5 x 4 cm in size, and had been there long enough it had thinned the skull. But we are lucky; it is sitting on top of the brain and not inside the brain. We are lucky that it thinned the skull instead of shifting the brain midline. We are lucky that it is not pressing on any nerves. We are still very blessed.
The next few months were filled with many, many doctors' appointments back and forth from Albany to Macon to the pediatric neurologist that we did have to end up seeing because the neurosurgeon wanted to try medication first to see if the headaches could be controlled another way and to see if they were really migraines or created by the pressure of the cyst. We traveled back and forth from Albany to Atlanta and from Albany to Columbus. Ashlee has endured so much lab work that I cannot count. We have had CT scans and MRIs. We have gone through so much medication, I feel like I could have started a pharmacy because she would take it just long enough for them to realize it was not working and then she would be changed to something else (usually a combination of 3-6 medications at a time).
She has been a trooper and she has endured more than I can imagine most people could let alone a teen. I am so proud of her.
The final decision has been made to drain the brain cyst because nothing else has worked and by process of elimination this has to be the cause of her issues. We are relieved to be having this surgery, especially since she has started having dizzy spells and passed out a few weeks ago. We are looking forward to a life with no pain or little pain. She lives now with a pain scale of 7 on a scale of 0-10. We are looking forward to her laughing more often and being able to enjoy life. We are looking forward to her hopefully not having to take so much medication if any medication. We are looking forward to her having a quality of life again. We are looking forward to her being able to go to school again and have good grades (she was an A student but currently is home schooled and is not passing most of her classes due to this illness). We really have so much to look forward to and we are hopeful.
It is very humbling to ask for help, however many of our friends have asked if there is anything they can do for us and donations are truly what is needed at this time. We have already spent $12,000 plus in diagnostic testing, medications and doctors' visits with just her medical bills related to this illness (not her feet) and have been fortunate to be able to pay these but have exhausted all of our resources to do so (because we have paid for 2 prior foot surgeries before this). It is difficult enough as a parent to have the stress of a sick child weighing on your heart but the burden of medical debt compounded with that makes it very difficult to keep your positive/healing presence to be able to take care of your child the way you should. My family is also looking at lost wages for the time that I am not working to take care of her because I do not have paid time off with my job since I have not been with them for a year. Your support would mean a great deal to my husband, myself and my children. It would mean the difference in our peace of mind. We thank all of our friends and family and anyone else who so feels moved to help us in our time of need.
I will keep you all updated as to Ashlee's progress in the weeks to come.
Sincerely,
Lisa Buck and Family