Samsmom: Life, Joy, Loss and Loving your Mitochondria

I’m breaking a rule here……

I try not to post names of doctors we have worked with personally….

But this doctor has recently created a little niche in my heart.

These last couple months have been very, very busy. I have started a new job and a new foundation and the two are very, very mutually exclusive of each other.

So as I’m trying to find my bearings on each I wonder, What the hell am I thinking?????

I find myself a bit (?) overwhelmed.

But we have a doctor….Dr. Van Hove, who works at Children’s in the metabolic clinic and now the new mitochondrial clinic.

When I first met him, he saw Samantha, gave his unknown diagnosis and made me cry.

The second time we saw him, he made me cry again….

But Dr. Van Hove’s job is not easy. He works with children who are chronically ill…..children whose bodies do not process energy correctly, children who are very, very sick and incredibly difficult to diagnose.

He is also a scientist. He will look at a child and observe their skin, their hair, toe nails, facial abnormalities….anything for what will give an indication of what is going on. The more we saw him, the more I appreciated his passion for his work, his dedication to find out what was really going on in these little bodies.

And now, Dr. Van Hove has become our Number One fan of Miracles for Mito. When I sent out our first email of 501c3 acceptance his response was….

WaHAW! Good Move…Johan

This response made me smile…..so out of character of our formal European scientist.

Today I invited him to our first board meeting, his response was…..

Thank you.

No really, thank you, Dr. Van Hove. If I ever doubt what we are trying to do, all I need is an international doctor of your caliber to validate what it is needed…and the importance of what we are trying to create.

And the world doesn’t seem quite so overwhelming.