Good Afternoon! Hope everyone had a great Valentine's Day. Five years ago on Valentine's Day our family moved into our current home in Woodforest. I always joked about how any gift could ever "top" that Valentine's Day gift....and this year my gift was the greatest one ever! We were in the hospital with our son, Ryan, who had another brain surgery and this time his AVM is gone and so are his seizures! They ended up separating his entire right side of his brain from his left side. Pretty much the entire right side was either damaged, had an AVM, or was causing seizures so it really wasn't doing much of anything except causing trouble. Along with that great news, came some really exciting updates on our research with Dr. Chen and Dr. Kim. We will hopefully have a write up soon we can post with the results. Until then, we just want everyone to know that the research is going very well and more rapidly than anyone thought it would. We started up our Student Ambassador program with a kick-off meeting this past Sunday. These kids are so amazing and have such giving hearts. They will be selling raffle tickets for our 4th Annual Crawfish Boil on Sunday, April 14, 2019 so be on the look out for those. If you or anyone you know would be interested in being a student ambassador, please contact us. Thanks and God Bless everyone for their prayers and support!
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     Happy Belated 2019! This time of year is full of optimism and hope with New Year's Resolutions. Some of us make them, some of us don't. The truth is that every day is a new day and you can start fresh every single day. Don't be so hard on yourself...after all....we are only human:)
     With that being said, AVM Research Foundation is starting something "new" this year. We are going to add a Student Ambassador group to our foundation. We are looking for any person who is in high school or younger to help us increase awareness and help raise funds. If your child is interested, or someone they know, please contact us. You can be anywhere in the world, not just in Texas! The fundraisers don't have to be EPIC (although I know they all will be!! )Have a fun run, a bake sale, or get with your school and have a "hat day" where anyone who wants to wear a hat that day has to pay $1 and the funds go to our foundation. Think of your children's baseball teams, football, cheer, social clubs, churches, gymnastics...the list goes on! We can sign paperwork if your child needs volunteer hours for school or anything else. 
     We have made great strides this past few months with our research! We plan on announcing all that has been going on soon! We feel this is a "Godwink" to let us know that we are doing exactly what we are supposed to be doing to help others who are facing the diagnosis of an AVM. If anyone needs speakers at an event, we would be more than happy to do that and bring about awareness.
     On a different note, Ryan is looking at another brain surgery this February 12th. It is hopefully his last (he has already had 3)! He still has AVM left in his brain. Also, he is experiencing almost constant electrical activity that is causing his cognition to not be at his greatest. We hope to eventually get him off all of his seizure meds or at least decrease the dosage drastically, as they are making him extremely tired and his quality of life is definitely lacking due to excessive sleeping. Also, we are waiting on an artificial skull to be made and sent to his surgeon so that they can reconstruct his skull, as the bone reabsorption due to the surgeries has deformed his skull and it is as thin as an "eggshell". Please pray for our foundation and for the surgeons and staff, Dr. Roc Chen and Dr. Niton Tandon for everything to go smoothly and for all results to be positive. Pray that God guides their hands and their decisions. Thanks and looking forward to a wonderful and blessed 2019 for all! Thanks for all of your prayers and support!   ~AVM Research Foundation