Latest Ivie Adventure

I've always wondered: what type of person would write a blog? What situation would motivate a person to broadcast miscellany to an anonymous and limitless audience? Following this pattern of questions, I also wonder: what types of people read blogs? Who is interested in random rantings of others and why? I suppose this is the first blog in my journey to discover and sift through information in my great experiment.
Thankfully, life has thrown the Ivie family a new adventure which - I fear - will be a broad and long topic. What a great opportunity for me to embark on my Great Blog Experiment. Yes, as you've probably heard, Kass has a cyst on her brain that is putting pressure on her brain stem.
I'll start at the beginning, but for brevity I'll try to keep the details as concise as I can. She's had constant headaches for about 2 months...(I'm guessing 72 days, but who's counting!) It never goes away, but varies in intensity. Nothing has seemed to help. Last Thursday, she had another extreme headache on her way to school. Kevin happened to be with us, and as dad's sometimes do, said, "Enough is enough. We're figuring this out today. Get her in with a doctor now, or take her to the ER." We ended up with a MRI on Friday. Since we were leaving for Louisiana for Awana Missionary Regional Meeting Family Camp on Monday, we called our good friend (an out-of-town doctor in our medical group) and asked if he could peek at the results on Sunday night. After seeing the abnormality, he said we couldn't leave without a neurosurgical release. The report shows that the cyst is putting pressure on her brain stem (which controls stuff like breathing - kinda important). Late Monday night, we got word that she was okay to travel to Louisiana with no restrictions. We will see specialists as soon as they deal with the bureaucracy on their end, and make time in their scheduling. They also gave her some good pain meds; they seem to help so far. Today was the first time her headache was a "1" since we could remember. This is good! I am reserving more details until I have a clearer picture of how we will proceed.
School has been difficult this year since her headaches basically started with the semester. I am hopeful that the medication will work short term, and that they will be able to find a long term solution to relieve whatever is causing the headaches.
So, a few of my questions from my Great Blog Experiment may have an explanation. Blogger Motivation: the instant world of email, text, Facebook, and Twitter don't seem to fit every situation. My home constantly "sings" with multiple ringtones from devices in every room of every make and model signaling every mode of communication currently offered on our service contract. Most messages are interesting and important. Many messages are irrelevant and distracting. But a few are vital. With a blog, I can communicate to those interested without worry of being a "cyber-spaz". i.e. I don't have to worry about bothering people with things that are important to me, but not necessarily others.
Bloggee (that's you) Motivation: Likewise, people who visit the blog are interested in the content. Don't care, don't click. i.e. if you want information and updates you can visit the blog, but alerts shouldn't constantly ring.
Not every post will be about Kassarah (to her delight), but at this point, this blog is probably the best place to get updated information. Please feel free to signal me through any mode of communication that you prefer...our home can always use a little more "singing electronics".