The world's greatest nephew.

This was written while Pearl and I drove to through Virginia on our way to surprise my mom for Christmas, a couple of weekend's ago.

So this blog has been a long time coming. For example I took this pictures back in October and I’m just now putting my thoughts towards it. The reason for the delay… I just didn’t know what to say, believe it or not I, Me, Matt Parks, was at a lost for words.

Well, to be honest I’m still at a lost for words so here it goes.

The pictures below are of my little nephew Gabe. He’s a great kid, full of energy, respectful and sweetness, yet just enough rowdy, roughness and one could say just plain ol’ Boy to be lots and lots of fun. Pearl and I simply love the kid.

The thing with Gabe is that he’s growing but not at a normal pace. Not slow enough to cause worry, yet not fast enough to call normal. He also bruises really easily, I would say I got that from Pearl, but since he’s my nephew from my sister, that’s just not possible and even though I’m from the south I’m not from that part of the south.

Another thing is that he’s “tummy”, which I’ve learned is baby language for gut, was always sticking out, like he’s got a little beer gut, but once again I’m from the south but we don’t nurse on bud, at least not most of us, and why am I saying us, I’ll never nurse unless God has a really crazy trick up his sleeve.

Last thing, Gabe’s liver and Spleen were always a little large. Once again, each thing by themselves the doctors where able to explain away, it was just when all were together that caused some questions to start being asked.

Those questions led to a year that turned at least 2 of my brother-in-laws 3 gray hairs their snowly color, and caused my sister to shed more then a couple of hand fulls of stress-anxiety induced tears.

After a year of testing, year of probing, year of worrying and coming up with some of the funniest stories ever told of a 3 year old in a hospital gown Gabe was finally diagnosed with Gaucher disease.

Gaucher disease is a disorder where your body is missing the enzyme necessary to break down the fatty substances in one’s blood. The fat then builds up over time in an organ, that organ fails and as of 10 years ago they would have simply removed that organ, scratched their head in bewilderment, then a couple of years later removed the next organ, and this would continue until they removed your very last organ for burial. Great process… NOT.

But we live in an amazing time in history, a time where we have enough freedoms and knowledge and all the other glorious things that make the world good for scientist to have enough time to stop making bombs and test hamsters. Chinese hamsters in fact, and in this testing of Chinese hamsters they discovered that their ovaries carry the missing enzyme to correct Gaucher disease.

So now, my nephew instead of building up fat in his organs till it kills him around the age of 30 he can go to Atlanta every two weeks for a 3 hour infusion of this missing enzyme and live, live a normal life and be a normal kid.

So the pictures below tell of our journey. Of leaving early in the morning, forgetting shoes, fighting traffic, arriving at the center, Gabe starting the infusion, us walking around, putting together puzzles, and watching movies while he’s attached to his little backpack-enzyme-infusing-life-giving machine full of Chinese Hamster Ovaries magic.

We finished this treatment with a nice round of Indian food and then watched Gabe’s little eyes finally give out during his car ride home. I’m amazed at our bodies and how wildly they are created, finely tuned and put together. I’m disgusted that the brokenness of the world extends past the selfishness and hate of grown ups and some how finds it’s way into little boy’s body’s, yet I’m humbled that God loves us so much to not leave us in the middle of this broken mess called humanity but gives us creativity, intellect, and insight to be able to correct some of the wrongs we see around us.

Here’s the pics, hope you enjoy.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.