Amber: Thursday Morning Update.

*This post is an update in a series of posts on my friend Amber, who is currently in the hospital. You can read the earlier posts here.

**Also, the family has set up a blog to keep friends and family abreast of what's going on and also to help reduce the feeling of obligation to update everyone individually. Most of the posts will be duplicates of my posts here.

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Today was scheduled to be the day the doctors would begin waking Amber up, but their plan has changed slightly.

Since the doctors were still unsure about the cause of the severe seizure activity Amber was having, the doctors brought in a couple of specialists last night and this morning to examine Amber and her case. They ran some additional tests and believe they found an infection in Amber's abdomen. They have started her on three heavy duty antibiotics. Since they think the infection may have been causing the seizures, they have decided to wait one more day to wake her up, which will allow the antibiotics another full 24 hours to begin working. Amber is scheduled for an MRI of her abdomen today, so hopefully that will provide some more concrete information for the doctors to go on.

With this new development, the doctors now plan to begin weaning her off the coma-inducing medication tomorrow, Friday. With the half-life of the meds being at least 15 hours, we expect to start seeing a more visible change by tomorrow evening, but it could be well into Sunday before the meds are completely out of her system.

The doctors continue to be hopeful, which of course is promising news to us, because she is normally a very healthy person with no history of seizures or other major health problems. They have also said, that despite the many tubes and machines she is hooked up to and how uncomfortable she may seem, she is actually very comfortable. This was happy news.

Amber is a fighter. I'm certain she is just (im)patiently waiting for the doctors to give her body the cue that it's time to begin waking up.

Thank you SO much for all your love and concern. So many of you have asked what more you can do to help besides pray. Honestly, all of your positive thoughts, prayers, and love are so important right now. I know Amber is able to feel your prayers and love, and we can too. So thank you.

As you can imagine, JP and the family have been bombarded with phone calls from people who truly care about Amber and her family. The amberjoygiles blog has been set up to alleviate the phone and text updates and allow JP and the family to update everyone at one time, saving time that is more wisely spent at Amber's side. Visits are being kept to family only at this time, but if anyone has any letters or messages for Amber or the family, please feel free to use the comment section of this blog or the amberjoygiles blog and we'll be happy to deliver them. They will be very much appreciated!

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