Just a couple weeks after his second son was born, Thorsten noticed that something wasn’t right.
After a visit to the hospital, he got a message that no parent should ever have to hear. The doctors couldn’t do anything and they didn’t know how long his son would live.
Thorsten was understandably devastated and he decided to share what happened on Facebook to help educate other parents.
What Thorsten wrote:
“In the picture you see my son John.
At first glance, he looks almost like any other baby, but John has been through more than I have in my 34 years in his first two months.
About 14 days after his birth, John started becoming restless, agitated and he had light bouts of the shivers.”
“The midwife said that it was caused by the rapid birth and recommended that we go to the doctor the next day.
That night it was so bad, we went to the hospital.
He immediately went to the maternity ward and received prophylactics, antibiotics and antivirals.
After several tests and four days of waiting, the diagnosis came: herpes simplex virus.
John had caught the herpes virus somewhere and it was able to travel through the not yet formed blood-brain barrier into the brain, where it became enflamed and caused extensive damage.”
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10210519804180822&set=a.1628597724290.85896.1517004479&type=3&theater
After five weeks of aggressive antivirals, EEGs, ultrasounds and MRIs, came the hard truth:
- Large parts of his brain are badly damaged and destroyed.
- John will never grow up like his big brother.
- The inflammation in the brain seems to continue despite the fact that the virus is destroyed, and the doctors can’t do anything about it.
- John has to fight alone, and no one can tell if he’s gonna make it, or if he still has years, months, weeks or days to live.
Almost every human being carries the herpes virus, but only a few people have outbreaks.
We don’t want to stigmatize anyone, we just want to remind you:
Cold sores are potentially contagious.
Stay away from babies. Don’t even look in the stroller, you could infect the child even if you’re not having an outbreak.
It’s too late for John.
He’ll never be healthy again.
We don’t want condolences, we want something more important: Take this post to heart and share it.
Herpes is now dismissed as an annoying corollary of a stressful life, the dangers are hardly known.
If you care to save a child’s life, save him.
We’ll never know, but then John’s hard way got meaning.”
The Herpesviral encephalitis that affects John is an unusual form of meningitis that results from the more common form of herpes virus, herpes simplex virus.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10209719349089945&set=a.1549157778341.68382.1517004479&type=3&theater
Help spread Thorsten’s important message by pressing the share button below. Together we can save lives!
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