Our family will be participating in SEPPA's 2019 PANS/PANDAS Awareness Walk on October 19th in Roswell.  If possible, we'd like you to join our team & walk with us and/or make a donation of any amount.  Your donations will help provide Pediatricians with education on how to diagnose & treat PANS/PANDAS & much more!  

As you all know, Caleb was diagnosed with PANDAS a little over a year ago now.  Before this, he showed no signs of anything off, just a little anxiety.  While PANS/PANDAS can have many triggers, the basics are its typically caused by Strep bacteria.  Sympoms vary, but with Caleb it resulted in episodes of irritability, anxiety, tics and severe OCD.  PANDAS is treatable, but there is no single cure.  Its a constant roller coaster of gains and losses.  

Some of the things are family has done to try to help Caleb are being on longterm antibiotics, CBT therapy, relocating to TN for 3 weeks while Caleb received therapy for his OCD & IVIG treatments.  The hopes of doing IVIG treatments is putting more antibiodies in him to help fight the infection attacking his brain.  He has currently had 2 treatments with another one scheduled in a week.  

Overall, I would say Caleb is at a MUCH better place than he was when initially diagnosed, but he still struggles.  Every day is a challenge for him and our family.  Our plan right now is to continue with IVIG treatments & antibiotics & pray, not only for Caleb, but for everyone with PANS/PANDAS.  We didn't have any warning sign that our child would be changed overnight & its a scary place to be in.  We were lucky our Pediatrician had at least heard of PANDAS enough to start us in the right foot, but even she said, she was not educated in it.  We just looked at her like- ahhh, that’s great... you know what he has, but not how to help.  so.very.scary.

Please consider helping our team- #STEPPIN’FORCALEB