Incidental Finding.

July 10, 2025 - How. What? What do you mean. Sam attended an all day outdoor day camp called OEL. The boys absolute favorite camp of the summer. Sam came off the bus on a 95+ degree day at 4:15 in tears and asking to go home immediately. His head hurt. Ben was able to fill me in that Sam was sick through the afternoon, slept through the reptile house (his favorite part of the day) and had vomited on the bus. Admittedly this had happened before. Sam's young, keeps up with the big boys and crashes hard. I didn't think much of it and started the process of helping him feel better. I got the boys home and settled and quickly got Sam in the bath. My odd mom fear was heat stroke. A good friend who had heard about Sam's sickness from her boys called to check in. She's an NP and must have heard it in my voice because she came right over to check vitals. High temp and rapid heart rate. Lethargy. Vomitting. With her encouragement I took him to Children's Mercy South for a "quick bag of fluids, just to be safe"... The CMH ER doc (Dr. Shipman) let me know right away he thought it was a virus and he had seen several cases the last 2 weeks. I debated him. What, no, he was at camp. It's really hot. He assured me summer virus. But hey, heat stroke or virus, the treatment of fluids, pain management and labs began either way so they got to work. Fast forward a few hours, with half a bag of fluids and ibuprofen on board, Sam's headache wasn't better. Labs came back normal. Wasn't even really showing dehydration (despite the IV debacle). ER doc mentioned again it was likely this nasty bug and he would go ahead with some Tylenol to get on top of the headache and finish the full bag of fluids just to be safe. I was ready to go home. We could take it from here. Dr. Shipman stated he wasn't in the business of letting kids with severe headaches go home when he thought they were still in pain. We waited a bit, and when the Tylenol didn't seem to help we were offered a 'migraine cocktail'. Not terribly common for age 7, but I had mentioned Sam got headaches once a month and was a sleeper. Dr. Shipman mentioned with the migraine cocktail he could also order a CT but it wouldn't confirm or show the virus whatsoever. In a moment of complete gratitude for our privilege, and maybe a flicker of mom-tuition I said go for it. Migraine cocktail and a CT. Dr. Shipman re-emphasized the cost benefit analysis of the test and casually mentioned it would be possible for a referral to neuro for those occasional headaches if we went ahead and did the scan. Go for it. During the CT, I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach that hindsight could only say was a mom knowing. I watched the tech. He made a face and quickly brushed his hand over his mouth. I told myself he was tired and it was nothing. Didn't say a word. And after the fact I will never in my life forget that instant of movement. He saw it and knew.

An hour later... Dr. Shipman came in and point blank said "your son has a brain tumor". Sam was finally sleeping peacefully while our world as we know it, crashed down in that room. Dr. Shipman than became our biggest advocate. Surprised, but calm. Collected but anxious. Honest that this wasn't his thing but he would wake up the attendings and get us answers. With gratitude, we were cleared to take our baby home around 3am. I won't ever forget the brilliance of the full moon as Chris carried Sam to the car. Stunningly beautiful. And for what it's worth... it was a 48 hour virus.