On September 17, 2026, Antony was experiencing extreme abdominal pain. He was pale, nauseous and weak. After a miserable night in the ER, he was admitted into the hospital. We found out that his kidneys had a renal infarction (blood flow getting cut off, causing the parts of his kidneys to die) caused by clots in his renal arteries. We discovered that those arteries as well as his external iliac artery had dissension (tears that cause bleeding within the walls of the arteries). He has swelling in his gallbladder, spleen, and liver. He had fevers every evening that would go away in the day. He has carotid stenosis, which we don’t yet know the meaning of. There is still a lot unknown, specifically what caused these tears, why all of the sudden with no pre existing condition or family history. We were transferred from Hunterdon medical center to Morristown medical center for a higher level of care. We still don’t have answers. There has been long nights, streams of questions from many specialists, so much blood drawn it would make a vampire blush, so much testing and now we are down to the wire. There was a ray of sunshine today. For the first time, his numbers are improving. One of the working diagnosis is fibromuscular dysplasia, which is extremely rare and does not fit the puzzle perfectly. They are doing a full PET scan and MRI tomorrow. However there is a chance we will end up being transferred again to mount sinai for even more specialized care with doctors who have seen more rare conditions. -- The MRI results came in and they are changing their unofficial diagnosis to SAM, segmental arterial mediolysis. The diagnosis is rare. Since it was discovered in 1970, less than 150 people in the world have ever been diagnosed with this. Not much is known about it, and there is no current treatment plan. There is some good news though. It's rare enough that we are reaching out to anyone who has studied it and they may be willing to look into his case, especially since some of them are in Philly and not far. It also seems like while the initial mortality rate is high, the body often creates scar tissue over the tears that prevent future incidents. Many people discover this because of an aneurysm, and often don't survive. Anthony's tears have been partial, bleeding into the inside artery well and causing pain rather than full rips bleeding into the abdominal cavity and causing death. In that sense we are very lucky. Right now, since treatment options are limited or unknown, the concerning thing is getting him stable. His blood thinners are continuing to go up, he is in pain, and getting fevers most nights. He needs a lot of prayer and positivity.
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