Rally behind Ryan, Kelsey, and Kinley Grace

Friends,

I AM CALLING YOU TO ACTION on behalf of the Carnahans; Ryan, Kelsey, and sweet Kinley Grace. 

First, I want to begin with the IMMEDIATE needs, and then you will get to read the entire story.

In a nutshell, on November 19th, Kinley Grace entered this world 12 weeks early--at just over 2 lbs--due to several complications. And soon afterwards, Kelsey found herself undergoing ANOTHER emergency surgery with several more complications. Medical bills have sky-rocketed, and because this is considered a "preexisting condition," insurance won't cover a dime. They are looking at a hospital bill of $750,000 when all is said and done. Kinley will remain in the hospital until February. 

Ryan has had to take unaffordable time off work to tend to his family, and they have had to send their 1-year-old son to Grandma and Grandpa's house--4 hours away. And on top of everything else, their roof has started leaking, their family vehicle needs repair, and they are facing a mold issue in their home. All while juggling life driving to and from the hospital EVERYDAY.

THAT'S WHERE YOU COME IN. 

They need your financial assistance ASAP! Meals have been covered, but they need financial provision NOW. 

They need the money to fix their car.
They need the money to replace their roof. 
They need the money to pay their bills because of Ryan's time off.
They need the money to eradicate the mold in their home before Kinley can come home.
They need the money to completely wipe out this enormous hospital bill. 

Please SHARE, SHARE, SHARE this fundraiser and GIVE, GIVE, GIVE  what you can TODAY. 

The Carnahans Story (as told by Kelsey):

I’m going to warn you now that this post is going to be quite lengthy. If you want to read it, great – if you have no desire to spend the next 10 minutes reading through this, don’t. Writing it all down is more for my own sanity and therapy than anything else, I just needed an outlet to process and get through my emotions. So with that being said, I want to start at the very beginning, and tell our story briefly, but thoroughly enough for anyone who has been following along to better understand the entirety of the last few weeks, and what has been happening in our family.

(Feel free to skip to the end for an update on Kinley Grace and myself.)

Ryan, Jack, and I took a trip to Oklahoma on Sunday, November 11th. Ryan had a work trip, so Jack and I were staying in the hotel while he was away for training. On Monday night, Jack woke up in the night puking. The following morning, I also woke up puking. It was that morning that I noticed I was not feeling Kinley move. Over the next few days, Jack and I battled a short-lived stomach bug, and then travelled on to Neosho, Missouri to visit Ryan’s mom, before continuing on to Coffeyville, Kansas to see his Dad. From Tuesday morning until Friday afternoon, I didn’t feel Kinley move a single time and was now becoming really concerned.

When we arrived in Coffeyville, our first stop was the hospital to see if we could hear Kinleys’ heartbeat. After a quick Doppler check, we heard a strong heartbeat in the 150’s, and that lessened our fears. It was believed that because I had been sick, that I was dehydrated and just needed fluids to get her moving again. So we went to Ryan’s dads house, and I hydrated like mine and Kinleys’ lives depended on it. That night I felt her move twice and was hugely relieved. On Saturday though, I didn’t feel her moving again, and still felt like something was wrong. After talking to Ryan we decided that if Kinley still wasn’t moving when we got home from our trip on Sunday, then we would go and get another ultrasound on Monday.

We left Coffeyville early in the morning to drive back to Tulsa Oklahoma for our return flight at 8 a.m. The whole drive to the airport I had a nervous feeling in the pit of my stomach. It had been 5 days and I had felt our daughter move only twice. We got on the first flight, made it to our layover destination, and then boarded our other plane. We got back into Seattle around 1 p.m. on Sunday, November 18th. We drove home, and all of us settled in to go to sleep.

Around midnight I woke up with a severe pain in the right side of my neck. A pain so intense not only did it wake me from my dead sleep, but it woke me up crying. For over an hour I tried to get comfortable, and tried to massage my neck and make it go away. Ryan finally woke up to me crying and struggling to breathe a little after 1 a.m. on Monday morning. I told him that I was fine, that I was going to try and go back to sleep, but the moment I laid back down the pain intensified so badly that I was hyperventilating and couldn’t take it anymore. Ryan decided then that we were going to the hospital.

We arrived at Evergreen Hospital around 2 a.m. and they began asking about pain level, symptoms, and so forth. As soon as we told them that I was 28 weeks pregnant, they put a heart rate monitor on me to monitor Kinley during all of the tests and observations. The first readings on Kinleys' heart rate monitor were worrisome; her heart rate dropped rapidly and then would rise, and drop again. It did finally balance out after a few minutes, but they wanted to keep an eye on it, and run some tests on her as well. As for me, they saw that my blood pressure was really high, and were concerned that I may be suffering from preeclampsia.

After several hours, they decided that they’d just be observing me for the next few hours, and so Ryan went home to be with Jack and try to get some sleep. That was around 6 a.m. By 7:30 that morning, Kinleys heart rate was acting up again, to the point they almost couldn’t get a reading. The doctor decided we needed to quickly do an ultrasound and call in a maternal fetal medicine specialist to decide if our baby girl would need to come out, or if she was safe to stay in a little longer. I called Ryan to let him know we would be doing the ultrasound, and that we would possibly be having a C-section later in the day. Within minutes I was wheeled to a room, and within minutes again, I heard the doctor telling me that we needed an emergency C-section – within the next 20 minutes. I called Ryan again and told him he needed to get back to the hospital as soon as possible. All the while, I was being prepped for surgery and was told that we couldn’t wait for Ryan to make it to the hospital before they began. I was terrified.

The nurses got me into a cap and a gown, took my clothes, hooked me up to all kinds of machines, and wheeled me into the OR. The anesthesiologist told me that they were going to use a spinal block so that I could stay awake during the procedure, but that I wouldn’t feel any pain. While she got that started, I was breathing very raggedly, and trying so hard to control my sobs. Another nurse was trying to coach my breathing and reassure me that everything was going to be okay, and that she wouldn’t leave my side during the whole ordeal. All I wanted in that moment was my husband to be by my side, and I had no idea if he’d make it in time or not. Just then, my legs went numb, and I was laid down onto the operating table, where they then placed a catheter, and the surgeon prepared to make his test cut. Right then, my sweet Ryan came rushing through the door and was at my side. All I remember after that is the worst pain I’ve ever felt in my life, and then waking up in recovery. My spinal block didn’t work, and the anesthesiologist ended up having no choice but to put me under general anesthesia.

Kinley Grace Carnahan was born at 8:14 a.m. less than 24 hours after we returned home from the Midwest. I cannot even begin to describe how thankful I am that we made it home before we lost her, and that we went into the hospital when we did. Our surgeon told us that had we waited another day before coming into the hospital, they could have lost us both. It turned out that the umbilical cord was reversing blood flow – so I was essentially not getting any blood to our baby girl. Because of this, she was smaller than your typical 28-week baby and weighed only 2 pounds and 3 ounces.

It was 2 days before I was able to get out of bed long enough to be able to go and see our daughter. And even then I only got to stay for about 15 minutes because I was so tired and weak so quickly. I was finally discharged from the hospital on November 22nd in the afternoon. Ryan took me home and got me propped up in bed to try and rest and recover, but that night, the neck pain that brought me into the hospital in the first place, returned. This time it presented itself on the left side of my neck and body, and once again I was struggling to breathe. Ryan quickly took my blood pressure and called the hospital to see if we needed to come in. My blood pressure was 164/133, and we were told to come in immediately. When we got back to the hospital, my blood pressure reading had increased even more to 172, and I began bleeding heavily, all the while trying not to hyperventilate. After running many tests, again the doctors couldn’t tell me what my neck pain was coming from and all they could do was put me on an ibuprofen regimen to control it. They kept me overnight to make sure that my blood pressure didn’t spike again and that my bleeding stayed under control, and I was sent home the next afternoon, November 23rd.

Over the next few days I had follow up appointments, and lots of trips to the hospital to see our Kinley. Little Kinley was making excellent progress, and I was finally starting to feel like I was on the mend, and that this nightmare was beginning to slow down. Then, on the night of the 26th Ryan got a call from our friend who has been staying on our couch, that water was pouring through the ceiling into the living room. We had to rush home from the hospital so that Ryan could patch the roof and stop the leak. Over the course of 6 days, our world had been rocked, and this felt like our breaking point.

On top of everything that was already happening in our life, we began to notice that the head gasket on our Toyota was getting closer and closer to needing to be replaced, and with our new medical bills, now needing to fix our roof, and trying to finish the remodel that had already been underway on our bathroom, we didn’t know where we would find the time or the finances to cover everything that was happening.

We had a brief window of time from November 26th to December 2nd where all we had to focus on was visiting Kinley in the hospital, and my recovery. We thought the chaos was over, and that the next 3 months would be spent watching our daughters’ progress, and sorting out our finances and projects. Unfortunately, things took a turn for the worse on December 3rd. Ryan left for work that morning, and I slept in until I needed to take my medicine at 9 a.m. I got out of bed, took my medicine, and went into the kitchen to fix some breakfast. I sat down to eat around 10, and noticed that my stomach hurt. I started to get what felt like very intense cramping across my upper stomach off and on until 3 p.m. Ryan got home from work shortly after 3, and I told him that my stomach hurt and I was going to go and lay down for a while.

A while turned into 4 hours of my stomach pain getting worse and worse, to the point that I started feeling again like I couldn’t breathe, and couldn’t take the pain. I called my doctor 3 times over the course of lying down, and relayed to the nurse what was happening, only to be told that I likely had gas pains from post surgery and just needed to take my pain meds. After taking oxycodone and having zero relief, Ryan and I again decided to go into the hospital. I was afraid I may have internal bleeding or something else going on – but something was definitely wrong, and it wasn’t just bloating.

We got to the hospital just a little after 7, and immediately went to the maternity floor because we thought whatever was happening was post pregnancy related. They took me back to triage and started running tests to try and figure out what was going on with me. After a couple hours, they determined that my pain was not pregnancy or preeclampsia related, so I was sent to the ER for further testing. Around midnight, the doctor came in to go over the possibilities and walk us through the next phase of testing. He told us he would like to do a CT scan to try and rule as many things out at once as possible, and we agreed. About an hour later I was sent up to CT. Nearly an hour after that, we got results back – I was suffering from acute appendicitis, and a pulmonary embolism in both lungs. So many blood clots in fact, that they said they couldn’t count them.

I was then told that I’d need to have an ultrasound done on my legs to make sure that there were not more clots forming in my body before they could determine whether or not I’d even be able to make it through a surgery to have my appendix removed without risking a clot going to my heart, or bleeding out on the table. The ultrasound uncovered that I had an old clot in my left leg that was scarred over, and wasn’t too worrisome, but no new clots. The clot in my leg is known as a Deep Vein Thrombosis, or DVT, which is a clot typically in the leg or thigh and is known to break off as an embolus and make its way to the lung, where it can cause lung problems.

The doctor spoke with the surgeon, and they decided to put me on blood thinners until 4 a.m. to make sure that no new clots formed between then and my surgery scheduled for the following morning. They admitted me back into the hospital around 2 or 3 in the morning, and by 5:15 a.m. I was being wheeled off to pre-surgery to meet the surgeon and anesthesiologist. I don’t remember anything after that except waking up in my room that morning on a gurney, having to be transferred into the hospital bed.

Thankfully my appendectomy went well, I did not bleed out on the table, and there were no complications. I spent the next 3 days receiving a heparin drip to thin my blood again to prevent new clots, and lots of other medication to make sure my blood pressure stayed controlled, and to make sure my pain was under control. They monitored me closely with lots of blood draws, and lots of tests. It’s still not determined what caused the blood clotting, however we have been assured that I have the worst timing in the world to decide to have appendicitis, as it was not related to anything dealing with my pregnancy.

I was discharged on December 6th around 7 p.m. with instructions to continue my blood thinner and blood pressure medications, and also to give myself 2 injections in the stomach per day for the next week. I had a follow-up appointment on the 7th, and have another on the 9th to again monitor my blood. For the next 3-9 months I will be on blood thinners while my body works to dissolve all of the clots in my lungs, and then we will likely have another CT done to make sure they’re gone. This is overwhelming to think about to say the least.

I’ve never had a moment in my life where I was afraid that I was actually face to face with death. In the last two weeks I’ve experienced 3, where I have literally wept for my husband and my children, thinking that I was either not going to wake up from a procedure, or bleed to death, and never get to kiss my family again, snuggle my babies, or tell my husband how much I love him. It’s an incredibly sobering feeling, and honestly the most terrified I’ve ever been in my life. Pair that feeling with wondering if our daughter is going to pull through or not, and I’m sure you can imagine the emotional roller coaster that I’ve been on.

Yes, I’ve been through the ringer, my husband Ryan has had to sit by and let go of all control while our daughter and I have fought for life, and our son has been hours away. However, through these overwhelming, and crazy couple of weeks – we have also been overwhelmed by God’s mercy to us. In keeping Kinley in my womb until we got back to Washington state; in waking me up with pain so intense that it got us to the hospital to save our daughters life and mine, and again and again for keeping me safe through all of the complications that have followed. Yes, it’s been emotional, and we have been at our wits end a little too much lately, but God has been faithful, and has surely wrapped us up in his arms through it all – and we are not blind to that.

We have a long road to recovery for both Kinley and I, and no, we aren’t sure how we are going to make it all work – but I can’t tell you how thankful I am for a little girl that is thriving despite her odds, for family and community that came to our aid at a moments notice, for a husband who does everything he can to care for our family in the midst of trials with kindness and compassion, and for a God who never lets us go.

Kinley Update: Her HI-flow has been decreased again, and she is doing really well with only a few Brady events here and there, but thankfully nothing to be too worried over. She is tolerating her food, and has gained a whopping 10 ounces since birth! Her skin doesn’t seem as delicate, and she is growing less and less fragile every day. She’s also proven that she’s strong as an ox, as she enjoys frequently trying to roll off of her bed in her incubator. No updates on her brain yet, but nothing alarming either. The doctor thinks he will remove her PICC line today too.

Kelsey Update: I am sore and tired. I can’t stand up straight yet, and it hurts to laugh, cough, sneeze, or really anything. I have some phlegm in my lungs, which has been incredibly difficult to try and get up without being able to cough, but it’s very minimal and more annoying than anything else. I’m on blood thinners for the next 3-9 months, and injections for the next week. I’m still on blood pressure medication as well, and have to take my BP daily. I have lots of follow up appointments to attend and schedule, but I’ll get into that as they come. Overall, happy to be home where I belong and out of the hospital.