Grandma Nancy (Guest Post)

I remember the exact moment that I heard that Bridger was having seizures. We were at Hunter’s Seminary Graduation and we got a text message from Jake that said, “We are at your house, we think Bridger is having seizures.” We made it home as soon as possible and found Jake and Cretia desperately trying to contact their family doctor.

After that at least a week had gone by. Bridger had been to Primary Childrens Hospital where tests were done and a diagnosis of Infantile Spasms was given. I had not yet seen him have one of these seizures. Then one afternoon Jake and Bridger were at our house. Bridger was crying and I looked and saw that Lance was holding him, while Jake was timing something. Next I saw Bridger’s little body crunch up and I noticed discomfort in his face, while Jake was timing the seizures and counting the crunches.

I seriously wondered why this was called a seizure, because it looked nothing like the seizures that you see on T.V., or even in real life-when people fall down or shake uncontrollably. I was sure there had been some mistake made in his diagnosis. I thought maybe he had been exposed to some toxic substance that was causing these spasms, or maybe something in his baby formula. I researched all kinds of products from paints, and odor sealants to baby food.  The results were that I didn’t really find out anything that I had not already known.

Jake and Cretia said that the “main objective”, the top priority was to stop the seizures. It began to get very difficult to watch all that Bridger had to go through in order to accomplish this “main objective”.

The medicine regime was out of control. Half of the medicines were simply to counteract the effects of the other half.  Within no time the sweetest baby in the world turned into a prickly porcupine. He didn’t even want to be picked up or held. You had to just set him up in an infant seat and listen to him moan.

One day our good friend Russ Wallis came to the house to check on how everyone was doing. I remember telling him that what Bridger was going through was like something that you only read about in the Bible. When people would bring their suffering loved ones who were blind or lame, even children who were stricken with seizures to the Savior, Jesus Christ to be healed. There was no other option, nothing else could be done….and Jesus would heal them. I said and really felt that way about Bridger. I think Russ thought I had lost my mind.

Since then many of our friends and family, even strangers have joined us in prayer to ask for Gods intervention on Bridgers behalf. We have not seen him miraculously healed, but we have seen miracles. His body is pudgy and round, he still gets mad when you pick him up, he needs a lot of help to even roll over. But when you look in his eyes his spirit says, “I’m here!”  And on a good day he will even talk to you in his own special baby language.

We feel so blessed to be able to have him in our lives. So glad to be able to share in his care and growth. He makes our lives better. There really is nobody just like him.