Saving Stephanie

On the 26th of March 2017, my sister experienced a challenging medical situation. She started feeling nauseated and then started vomiting which prompted her to visit the emergency room where they didn't find anything wrong with her so she was sent home. A few days later on the morning of March 31st she suffered a seizure at work and was brought in through ambulance. At the hospital she suffered more seizures and was again released. That following night she was in my family’s care with seizure medication. Through the night she was experiencing gaps in her memory and the inability to eat or drink. The next day she slept all day which had us very worried. Not knowing what was going on, they had her see a neurologist. An MRI scan of her brain was done and the results showed there was nothing wrong with her neurologically.

In the care of Kaiser, she experienced multiple seizures and was in ICU, and soon she was intubated and ventilated on life support. The last time she spoke to me was on the night of our care when she looked up to me and said, “brother, I'm scared”. My family, relatives, and I stayed the nights with her and prayed together. It's hard to see my sister on life support in coma and still getting seizures. The clinicians trying to diagnose her were struggling to understand what was going on.

Within the same week, her treating doctor concluded the diagnosis as viral encephalitis. But then she was transferred here to UCSF where they found a tumor in her ovaries and had it removed . They lowered her sedatives to see if her seizures would go away but didn't. The doctors at UCSF scrapped the viral encephalitis diagnosis and then looked into it being NMDAR autoimmune encephalitis but ruled that out. They did tests for West Nile, Measles, and Lyme disease and those tests came up negative. So until now they’re still running tests on her around the clock trying to figure out what is wrong with her. Her seizures are more constant now and they are giving her more sedatives.

This fundraiser is for my sister and our family. So that we can continue fighting while being by her side.

This journey continues to be excruciatingly painful for my family and friends. I am hopeful my sister will wake up and that the doctors will give her the help she needs. For now, my family will continue battling by her side for her. Unfortunately UCSF doesn't have room for us to stay with her and this may take months for her to recover and having to stay in a hotel everyday and paying for food can also be costly.

The Bible says “be boastful in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope. Now this hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us”.

Thank YOU for creating the awareness, your contributions will help my sister Stephanie – God Bless