Reece's Story

Okay, so I've been debating on whether or not to post on Reece's story or not. However, after reading other blogs of families who have dealt with this it has inspired me to share it with you. For those who don't know, Reece was diagnosed with a sever form of type A Hemophilia. This means that he has less than 1% of the protein the body needs to form blood clots. There is no cure for it at this time, but it is treatable. Hemophilia is traditionally a genetically inherited disorder transferred from the mother. However, there is no known history of it in my family. They say that in about 30% of the cases it is a spontaneous gene mutation. We won't know until we have genetic testing done in a few months which form it is. If it is from me, there is a chance Olivia will be a carrier as well. Stay tuned for more on this once we've had the testing done.

I will say that when we initially found out, we were full of so many emotions. Fear is the first to come to mind, of the unknown mostly. We knew the basic definition of hemophilia, but nothing other than that. David went online for some research as soon as we found out ....big mistake. The stuff we read scared us to death. We decided to hold off on the research until we spoke to our Hematologist. After meeting with her we did feel a lot better. She reassured us that he will have a pretty normal life. He just won't be playing contact sports and he'll just have to be extra careful. So far it hasn't really been an issue for him, and probably won't, until he becomes mobile around 10 months old. I'm PRAYING he isn't quite as active as his sister. Most days she's practically hanging from the rafters :o) The toddler years are when the most injuries occur I think. They have so many bumps and bruises during that time which for most they aren't a big deal, but for him they will be. We've been told he will need a helmet until he's pretty sure footed. I'm still trying to accept that, but I know it will be fine. Other than this, we don't really know what to expect. We're hoping at our next appointment in a few weeks we'll get more information. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers.

If you are interested in more info. on Hemophilia please click on the link I have to the National Hemophilia Foundation's website.