Local heart transplant recipient Shawn Stockwell, 10, will be home for Christmas. He has a plane ticket to arrive Dec. 23.
Trista Stockwell, Shawn's mom, posted a blog Monday that read, “I am such a crybabyÉ I have cried off and on all day because my son has a plane ticket to go home for Christmas. A day that I thought would never, ever come will be Dec. 23.”
The Stockwells will go back and forth between Lucille Packard Children's Hospital in Palo Alto, Calif., and his home in Eagle River for several check-ups until Shawn only needs to see his doctors once every four months to monitor his health. His next check-up is Jan. 5.
Shawn waited for a heart in Palo Alto for more than two years before getting a transplant July 31.
In order for Shawn to leave Lucille Packard Children's Hospital, he needed to have a biopsy with perfect results.
Trista's blog read that Shawn's biopsy results were zero, the number that they were hoping for, so he would finally be able to come back to Alaska.
Shawn had an MRI scan on his brain Friday and Trista said he did amazingly well. He was unconscious and in critical condition during his last MRI and had no memory of it. Trista said he was a little nervous about the loud noise the MRI machine makes and having to sit still for half an hour, but “he did awesomeÉlike always,” she wrote on her blog.
Unfortunately, Shawn's MRI results were not as good as the family had hoped. The scan showed white spots on brain that are larger than a quarter. Doctors told Trista that Shawn has permanent brain damage and will be on anti-seizure medication the rest of his life; he will never be able to see correctly again and his ability to coordinate movements will always be affected.
She wrote on her blog Tuesday that she felt blindsided.
“I don't know what I was expecting...but I wasn't expecting to hear that it was permanent. I wanted to throw up. Still want to throw up... and throw things, and cry,” she wrote.
Doctors did point out, Trista wrote, that there's still a small chance that the brain trauma caused by blood leaking out the veins in his brain from his medications may dissolve.
“Miracles happen (obviously Shawn is still here with us),” Trista wrote.
But right now it's time for the family to pack up and head home for Christmas.
“That's so incredible that I have no words to even describe it É what a journey!” Trista wrote. “Now onto booking some tickets É I actually get to take my son home.”
