Brennan’s Buddies® © 2012
Tyler
Tyler was diagnosed with Infant Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia on 6/22/09 at 4 months old. Relapsed 4/15/11. Transplant 9/15/2011. This sweet little boy Earned his Angel Wings 11/2/2011.
Please read his full story HERE
THIS SHOULD NOT HAPPEN!
YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE!
This is a heartbreaking post from Tyler's Mom, please continue to pray for his family!........... Tyler is now in Heaven. Pain free and at peace. Flirting with all the cute girls and racing his cars all over the place. Filling the place up with his cheery laughter. He finally gets to meet my Grandpa, who he missed by only a couple weeks. I know he will be well cared for, but we will miss him beyond words.
Short version, he passed away in my arms after holding him for 3 hours. He was not awake or conscious but it felt good to have him in my arms again. It'd been almost 6 weeks. It was also nice to see him tube-free again.
Long version: They came at 1pm to unhook the dialysis circuit. As planned, they moved all the tubes,
Tyler’s story
pumps and everything to the one side of the bed so I could hold him. He was not expected to survive the change. With his blood pressures being what they were the last few days, they say nobody should be able to stay alive like that. I guess he just needed to cuddle his mommy for a while. The nurses were in tears. Our Oncologist and primary nurse visited us this morning. It was nice to see them again. Once he was settled in my arms, they unhooked dialysis. He kept holding on. His blood pressure actually went up for a while.
After a while his blood pressure slowly drifted downward. He was down to 16/9. They said with the blood pressure he had before, 50/30, he was no longer conscious. He hadn't woken in a couple days. His pupils were no longer reactive at all, which means the brain function is very minimal. With 16/9 there was no way the brain or anything important was getting enough of anything to survive. Tyler's fingers and his arms were getting cold. We had both told him it was ok to go. His whole life he has fought so hard, it's hard to change and let go, for all of us. This morning his liver, kidneys and tissues were much worse. Parts of him were purple from lack of oxygen. His body was really deteriorating. It was time to let him go. They gave us the option to turn off his blood pressure meds. They said it was mostly the meds keeping him going. Since dialysis was off though, they would not clear from his blood right away. So he kept going, very faintly. They offered to free him of his tube, something that didn't sound ok before but suddenly felt right in that moment, so we agreed. They took out the tube and he breathed on his own for about 30 minutes. They were very shallow breaths, often far apart. I kept wondering if each one would be his last. Finally he stopped. He looked so peaceful without his tube in. Both Drs confirmed and they declared him gone at 4:33pm.
It still feels unreal. I've watched him go through so much his whole life, laying hooked to all those tubes and machines the last 6 weeks. I felt him take his last breath and kissed his cold head goodbye. Yet I still can't believe my little boy is gone. We are numb, going through the motions in a trance. We had sandwiches but didn't taste anything. We didn't get out of the hospital until 9pm. Nurses played with Gabriel for 5 hours while I sat with Tyler and while we both held him after he was gone.
Some of these stories are heartbreaking. No parent should watch their child die, no child should suffer through the pain of treatment. Everyone needs to read these stories, they are real about real children, real families. YOU can help. Donate to research, write your congress. Our Gvt. Spends very little on childhood cancer research.
