Brooklyn Hunter

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Brooklyn is a nine year old girl who was diagnosed in September with a craniopharyngioma. Brooklyn had suffered from what we were told were migraines for years. Every few months she would get an awful headache, end up throwing up and falling asleep and wake up feeling better.

 

The weekend of September 5th 2020 she had one that we couldn’t get to go away. I took her to Children's close to home on Sunday 9/6 and we were sent home and told to go to the ER if it wasn’t better by morning. They would give her IV meds to get rid of it. The next day I took her to the ER in Dublin, it was close to our house and we were just expecting to get the IV and go home. The IV didn’t help, we were told to go to Children's. As we were walking to the car, she collapsed in the parking lot. I carried her back in and they transported us by ambulance to Children’s. No one thought it was as serious as it was and we had to wait 4 hours for the ambulance. I asked them to unhook her IV’s and I would just drive her myself. It’s so hard seeing your child suffer.

 

Once we arrived, She started losing consciousness and not making any sense. They did a CT scan and said she had excessive fluid in her brain, hydrocephalus. They came back moments later and said she actually had a tumor. They called the on call neurosurgeon and she was rushed to surgery to put in a drain. The scariest moment of my life. My mom had met us there but due to covid wasn’t allowed in. I called my husband, he took our then 7 month to my parents house and met me there while I waited for her surgery.

 

We learned the type of tumor and she was set for resection September 17th. Once the drain was in she was stable, just awaiting surgery. She woke up with part of her head shaved and no idea what was going on. The days after surgery she couldn’t walk, thought she was dying, couldn’t do basic functions. It was so scary.

They were able to do a complete resection through her nose but the tumor did destroy the stalk of her pituitary gland so that was severed during surgery. We spent a total of 30 days in the hospital. After surgery we learned she has Diabetes Insepidus, adrenal insufficiency, hypothyroidism and is panhypopit, zero pituitary functions.

We are beyond lucky, we know. Things could be much worse. Her vision was not impaired. She is back in school. She is alive and that’s all that matters. I still mourn the ‘old Brooklyn’ but am truly thankful she’s ok.

 

Brooklyn has an identical twin as well as two other sisters, a step brother and step sister.

She is doing mri scans every 3 months to make sure there is no regrowth, her next is April 21st. When she’s been in the clear for a year she starts growth hormone. She is about 6 inches shorter than her twin now so is excited to start growing again.

She is a warrior.

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