Before I continue on with Monday night let me back up just a little bit. For the past little while Clint and I have been looking for a house. We both felt strongly that it was time to try and get back out on our own. Things had been going pretty well for quite a while and we just wanted something that was ours again.
Well the day Clint got rushed to the hospital, Feb 1st, was the day we got the news that our offer had been accepted on the house we wanted. Now this house is not really dream house material but it was in our price range, had enough bedrooms for the boys, and the main selling feature is that it has a huge backyard for the boys to play in.
Well obviously things were a little crazy right then and I didn't know if we should move forward with the house or not. But Clint was pretty adamant that we keep moving forward with it.

Now back to Monday night. Like I said before, it had been a really good day. We were just getting ready to go to bed when all the sudden Clint started feeling really crappy. He started with some pretty severe diarrhea and vomiting and just did not feel good at all. Well this lasted for hours and at some point in the middle of the night he just looked at me and said, 'I'm done. I just can't do it anymore.' At this point I wish I could say I was totally supportive and said I understood or something but I didn't. We had just got the inspection done on the house and there were a bunch of little things wrong with it (little things to him, huge things to me) and I started freaking out. I was crying and saying 'I don't know what to do with this house. You have to help me. I don't know how to do anything'. So instead of consoling him like I should have, he was consoling me, like usual. He told me he was okay and we'd figure everything out.
Well the next morning we had an appointment at AF Hospital to get platelets. Clint really did not want to go, he just wanted to stay in bed. But we finally made it over there and ended up being there for a while getting a chest x-ray and stuff. When we got home our transplant coordinator LaDee called and said she wanted to send someone from hospice over to meet with us just so we'd have an idea of when or if we should go on hospice, which ended up being a huge blessing.
We were supposed to meet our realtor Aaron at the new house on Thursday but Clint decided we should go now, so he called Aaron and a couple friends, Sam & Doug, to meet us at the house that afternoon so we could go over all the issues from the inspection. While there Sam & Doug were able to tell us that everything was fairly minor and would be pretty easy to take care of. Once they told Clint this he turned to me and said 'See they will take care of you. I can die now.' I didn't like that statement at all, but it turned out he knew what he was talking about.
After going to the house we came back home and just hung out the rest of the night. He seemed to be doing alright, just extra tired. We put the boys to bed, watched some TV, and then went in to go to bed. He was laying on the bed and said that he needed to go to the bathroom, so he got up and headed there. I went with him which I'd been doing since he'd passed out a couple weeks earlier. But he didn't make it. He got to the bathroom door and started swaying back and forth, luckily I was right there and caught him and laid him down in the hall, while screaming hysterically for my parents. It was exactly what had happened exactly 2 weeks earlier. I asked him what he wanted me to do, even though I already knew. I asked him if he wanted to go to the hospital, he said no. I asked him if he wanted me to call 911, he said no. I knew he did not want to and could not go through what he'd just been through again. So I had my parents call his parents and call my brother Trevor who is a fireman/emt who just lives down the block. When Trevor got here we took Clints blood pressure and it was 53/32, his oxygen level started falling quickly and he wasn't very coherent. At this point we didn't think he'd make it too much longer so we called his brothers and sisters.
I think he knew it was time, but he just did not want to leave us. He has said that from the beginning, he was never scared to die he was just scared of leaving me and the boys. I think most of his family stuck around most of that night, I don't know for sure because I could not leave Clint's side. I don't think anyone got much sleep, I didn't dare sleep for fear I'd miss his last breath. I don't think any of us thought he'd still be with us in the morning, but he defied all the odds up to the last second.
Wednesday came with Clint still here, but we could tell he was getting more and more uncomfortable and it was getting really hard to get him to swallow any pain pills. Thankfully LaDee had sent hospice to meet with us the day before, so I called them and asked them to come as soon as possible with some pain medicine. Once they finally got here we were able to get him more comfortable which was good. The hospice nurse told us that it wouldn't be long, she didn't think it'd be more than a few hours at most.
Throughout this whole ordeal he was kind of in and out of consciousness. Some times you could get him to answer your questions and other times you couldn't. Some things he said would make complete sense and others no sense at all. He did have some pretty good one liners that day, I wish we would've written some of them down. Once when Camie was trying to give him morphine he told her she was 'royally pissing him off'. And I would get all sorts of responses when I would tell him I love him. Some of them were 'It's all good', and 'that's stupid' (stupid was definitely one of his favorite words that day) but luckily a few times he told me that he loves me too. He was also very agreeable, he would say yes to almost anything. When I was laying next to him I asked someone standing on the other side of the bed 'will you hand me a tissue' and Clint answered 'sure!' such a sweetheart.
Most of Clint's family and my family were at the house all day. The boys were here and would come in and out occasionally. I remember saying, 'man it'd be nice to be a kid your whole world is changing but you go watch a movie and everything's okay'. I'd like to hope it's because we had been preparing them for this for a while, but I think it's because they're just kids. They all came in a few different times and said goodbye to daddy and gave him hugs.
As evening came the weather outside took a turn for the worse, I could hear the rain falling hard against the window as I laid in bed with Clint. He'd been kind of holding steady all day when suddenly he took a turn too. You could hear in his breathing that things had changed. When the hospice nurse came she said that the oxygen wasn't doing much but prolonging death, she told us if we took it off it would speed things along. Well I'd asked Clint a few time throughout the day if he was ready to take it off and every time he would answer with a no, so you can bet I wasn't taking it off if he wasn't ready. Then came the moment, I knew he was ready. It still took me a few minutes, but then I removed his oxygen. A short time passed and while surrounded by most of our family members, and while I held him, he took his final breath. Right when he took his last breath the power went out, not just a flicker, total darkness. It was so crazy, and amazing. My dad brought in flash lights and lanterns, it was so beautiful and peaceful. As hard as it was to let him go it was so comforting to finally see peace on that beautiful face again, it had been such a long time since I'd seen that. It took the mortuary about 3 hours to get to the house and the power was out the entire time, but as soon as they stepped into the house the lights came on. Again crazy, and amazing! I told the boys that daddy had magical powers now:) I like to think he was sending us a sign just to let us know that he's still with us.
Clint fought for every second he had the last 10 months, and I will be eternally grateful for the memories we were able to make with the boys because he fought so hard. He truly is the most amazing man I have ever known. He took care of me up until the last second, and I know he is still taking care of me. He promised me he'd still be around to help me raise these boys, I told him I was not taking sole responsibility for screwing them up. Even though my heart hurts so bad sometimes I can't breathe, I know that he is up there watching over us. And I also know that he is mine for eternity, I just have to make it there. Tonight in his prayer Noah said 'and bless us that we can die' and after he was done I said 'Noah we don't want to die, we want to live' and he said 'but I blessed us that we can die so we can see dad'. I had to explain to him that we will for sure see dad again but we need to live first. I'm so blessed to have these three boys in my life. They are definitely what is keeping me going. I told Clint the day he died 'now I know why Heavenly Father sent us three boys that look exactly like you, it's so I can see your face everyday when I look at them, while you're not here'. How lucky am I?

So this post has been a lot longer than I thought and it has been very emotional for me. So if it doesn't make sense then sorry. I just wanted to try and get things written down for the boys before I forget stuff. I am so, so thankful for all the prayers that have been said and are still being said in behalf of me and the boys. I'm pretty sure that they are the main reason I can get out of bed each day. So please keep them coming, I might need them for a little while. Love you all! Good night.

So back to Saturday Feb. 12.....
It was a pretty bad day. Probably the worst we'd ever had at the hospital. It just felt like we totally fell through the cracks with everyone.
It all started when our nurse walked in. A float nurse. One that never works on East 8. On the day we are supposed to be going home.:( Clint asked him what the plan was for the day and he started to explain to us that about 9 or 10 they have a meeting with the dr.s called rounds (seriously). I wanted to punch him. Yes we know what rounds are moron. So I sat up and said 'Let me tell you what our plan is today. Clint needs platelets and phosphorous and magnesium, so you need to get them started asap because they take forever and we are going home today'. He looked at me like I was a little crazy and said he'd try to get things going. That was just the beginning, it just seemed like people were forgetting us left and right. Our med list came back without any of our antibiotics on it, and when I noticed it there was nobody still there that could help us. They tried to send us home without oxygen. Just a ton of things were going wrong. It felt like nobody cared how or when we left, which we'd never felt from there before.
When we finally got home around 8 pm we were both emotionally spent. We ended up having an okay night. Clint felt alright, just very weak. I didn't sleep much because they forgot to order the o2 monitor so I felt like I had to watch him all night to make sure he was breathing alright (just one more thing that was forgotten) and he didn't sleep much because he never really does.
Sunday was a good day. We hung out with the boys, had some visitors, and made some yummy valentine cookies. It was just nice to be together as a family, the boys were so happy to have their dad home. They seemed to have missed him more than usual this hospital stay, so it was fun to spend the day with them.
Monday was another good day. Clint was even feeling a little stronger, he even walked the hall and climbed the stairs a few times. My mom made us a yummy valentines dinner and Clint even ate quite a bit. It was a really nice day.
And then came Monday night...

Thank You

Yesterday was such an incredible day. Very emotional, very tiring, but so incredible. It was so amazing to see all the people who loved Clint. He made such an impact on so many people, and how lucky am I that out of all those people he chose me to spend forever with.
The funeral was beautiful. The talks were perfect. The musical numbers were amazing. I could not have asked for anything better. Thank you so much to all who came to show your love and support, and a special thanks to all those who talked, played, and sang. It means more to me than you will ever know.

So now I'm just trying to figure out how to go on with life. I really can't believe that this is my life now. It still seems so surreal. I'm not gonna lie, I'm pretty terrified. How do you just go on with life? How is anything really ever okay again? How do I teach my boys how amazing their dad is? How am I supposed to support them, not only financially but emotionally, spiritually, physically? There are just so many questions and right now I feel like I don't have any answers. And it's very scary.
Now don't get me wrong, I really think I'm doing okay. I have so much support, I have the two best families a girl could ask for along with the greatest friends around. I just need to remember to take it One Day At A Time. Hasn't that been our motto forever now. It is just too scary right now to look farther than tomorrow. So for now I will just go to bed and in the morning I'll wake up and get the boys off to school, it's probably time for them to get back to their normal routine.
Plus Clint's stuck with me forever:) It just seems like forever is really far away right now. But we will get there...One Day At A Time!

Memories

Clint's sister, Camie is putting together a book of memories from Clint's life to give to Nik, Nate, and Noah to help them remember their dad. So, we are asking all of you out there who knew Clint to please send us your memories! E-mail your thoughts and memories to c.brinkerhoff@yahoo.com

Thank you!

As many of you have probably heard by now Clint passed away Wednesday night. I am so grateful for all the prayers, messages, emails, posts, etc. that I have received, you have no idea how much they mean to me.
I was so blessed to have this man in my life. They do not get any better than him. As hard as Wednesday was it was so nice to be able to see peace on his face again.

Clint A. Jepperson

Clint A. Jepperson (36) passed away Wednesday February 16, 2011 surrounded by his family, after a valiant and courageous battle with acute myeloid leukemia.
Clint was born October 30, 1974 in American Fork to Dennis and Kathryn Jepperson. He graduated from American Fork High School. Clint is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and served as a missionary in the Michigan Detroit Mission. He has such an amazing testimony and was a great example to all who knew him.
Clint married Amy Dorton and they were sealed in the Mt. Timpanogos LDS Temple for time and all eternity. They have three boys, Nik, Nate & Noah, who are all ‘Daddy’s Little Boys’. He is the best husband and father anyone could ask for. Clint loved to be outdoors. He loved snowmobiling, jeeping, golfing, camping, and anything else he could do with his family outdoors. He even had a job that allowed him to be outside as an owner of a landscape company.
Clint is survived by his wife Amy; sons Nikolas (7), Nathan (7), and Noah (5); parents Dennis and Kathryn Jepperson; sisters and brothers Gwenna (Michael) Terry, Darren (Denise) Jepperson, Kent (Kim) Jepperson, Greg (Jill) Jepperson, Camarie (Jeffrey) Brinkerhoff; and many other close family and friends.
Funeral services will be held on Monday February 21, 2011 at 11:00 am in the 9th ward LDS church building 481 E 300 N Lehi, UT. There will be a viewing on Sunday February 20, 2011 from 6-8 pm at Wing Mortuary 118 E Main Lehi, UT and also a viewing at the church one hour prior to services.
A special thanks to all of the Dr’s, PA’s, nurses, CNA’s and everyone else up on East 8 at LDS Hospital. Especially the best transplant coordinator ever, LaDee. Thanks for making this journey a little easier. Also thanks to all of you who have helped us through the last 10 months, the thoughts and prayers were truly felt.
We’ll see ya soon sweetie! Love you!

We might be going home today! We have to get platelets before we leave, and maybe phosphorous and magnesium
So who knows when we'll get out of here. But we might be going home today!
I'm not gonna lie it scares the crap out of me (really out of both of us I think) to go home. Clint is still very weak. It is very frustrating for him because he feels good sitting in bed but when he gets up he can't do things he thinks he should be able to do. Everyone tells him he's doing really great but he is just really frustrated. My biggest fear is that this whole scary thing will happen again. I just don't know if Clint can go through it again (well he probably can but will he want to or should he have to). He is my hero! And I just pray that he made it through this latest trial so that we could have more quality time with each other and our boys.
Thanks again for all the prayers. We could not make it through the day without all of your support. Love you all and see ya at home! (hopefully:)

This is going to be a quick, short post. It is late and I really should be sleeping while Clint is sleeping.
So far we are still doing pretty good, way better than any of the docs thought we'd be doing. They are actually trying to kick us out tomorrow, but I don't really think that will happen. To go home Clint has to be able to do stairs (to get in and out of our house since we will still need to go to AF for transfusions) and he is still very weak. Yesterday was the first day he was even able to get out of bed (at least farther than the bedside commode)and an entire week in bed plus everything else his body went through has taken its toll on his poor body. Today we were able to go for a couple short walks but he tires very quickly and still gets a little lightheaded at times.
His blood pressures have been holding steady and he actually got turned down to 20% oxygen today, so we are making progress everyday. He is still very, very swollen even though he had 2 doses of lasiks yesterday and 1 today. Hopefully it is clearing some of the fluids out of his lungs since it is definitely not coming off his poor feet. He had a chest xray today which showed improvement over the one we had a couple days ago which is great news.
So overall we are doing as good as can be expected. He is very tired but is still as amazing as ever.
Once again we have been the recipients of a miracle. I really don't think anyone here at the hospital expected Clint to survive last Tuesday. We are so very blessed! Thank you to all of you out there who are keeping us in your thoughts and prayers. We love you!
Goodnight.

Oh and by the way according to Clint Today Is Superbalous! :)

One Day At A Time

That is our motto. Clint had me write it on the board in our room today. It says "One day at a time. Today is _______." Today we filled in the blank with good. He definitely made some progress, he went from 100% on his oxygen this morning down to 40% this afternoon so that was really good. His blood pressures are still a little low, but at least they seem to be holding steady. His body has started hanging onto some fluid so his ankles are huge (he said he likes it because it makes him look like he has some meat on his bones, he's a nut:) so they started him on some lasiks which helps flush his system (aka makes you pee more). It's not working great but at least he doesn't seem to be getting bigger. He is still on a ton of antibiotics and other things since they still don't know the cause of what happened because nothing has grown out in any of his cultures.
Right now I think he's a little frustrated because he just doesn't know what to tell anyone. The doctor told us today that we can stay here and see if he can improve enough to go home without hospice or we can just go home now on hospice and try to be comfortable for as long as we can. Sometimes it's a little hard because it seems like no one here has any hope we'll make it very much longer. Now don't get me wrong we both know that things do not look good and in reality we will probably not beat this leukemia (although I am still holding out hope for a miracle) but we also know that Clint has defied every odd so far. He has kept fighting and because of that we have had 6 months of wonderful time that our doctors didn't think we'd have. So as of now we have decided to stick it out in the hospital because for now we are seeing improvements and are hopeful to be able to go home and get a little more quality time together with our little family.
Clint is so exhausted and his whole body is very sore. But he still has such an amazing attitude. I wonder every day how I got so lucky to have him choose me. I love him so much and am blessed daily by being with him.
We truly appreciate all the thoughts and prayers. We are surrounded by amazing people who are such a strength to us. Please keep Clint in your prayers, and please hold your loved ones close to you. Love you all!

Yesterday was probably one of the scariest days of my life.
It started out just like any other day. I got up and got Nik & Nate to school and then I came home and hopped in the shower because we had a clinic appointment at 10:15. After I got out I went to wake up Clint so he could get ready for clinic, but when I touched his head I knew he was way too hot. We took his temperature and sure enough he had a temp of 104.6. Bad news. I was hoping once he got up and moved around and ate it'd start heading down. When he sat up in bed he said he felt a little lightheaded but didn't seem too concerned. He got up ate breakfast and stuff and we were just about ready to leave when he decided he should go to the bathroom first. He'd been in there for a bit when he called for me to bring him something. When I went in he was just standing up and he started swaying a little bit so I ran to him and he just sank into my arms. I yelled for my mom who luckily was close by at the computer and she quickly called 911. When I looked at Clint it was like he was looking through me so I asked him if he could see me and he said no, which really scared me! I got him back sitting on the toilet and thats when the paramedics arrived. They tried to walk him out to the family room but he quickly passed out again. The paramedics then carried him out to the family room (which he does not remember at all) and proceeded to take his blood pressure, etc. His pressure was really low,70/30, and he was very pale and confused. The Lehi paramedics were great and were willing to drive us up here to LDS in the ambulance so we could get him to our doctors.
When we arrived at LDS (after throwing up his breakfast in the ambulance) Clint was in SO much pain. His back and left shoulder were killing him. His blood pressure had dropped even lower to 64/24. And he couldn't quite clear his head enough to understand what was going on. Dr. Ashe and Shar came in and told us things did not look good and when people died of leukemia this is usually how they died. They started talking about dnr's(do not resuscitate) and what he wanted them to do and not do. It was all happening so fast. Luckily my dad was able to leave work and meet us at the ER when we arrived which helped me hold it together. They loaded Clint up with a ton of antibiotics. And a ton of fluid (I think they pumped 5 liters of saline in him the first couple hours we were here). Clint decided that he did not want CPR or an intubation done if it came to that. So we decided to just stay on east 8 and hope the antibiotics did something. The doctors told us we should get our kids up here asap along with the rest of our family.
At this point his blood pressure was still dangerously low and he was also on oxygen. Within a few hours his temperature had returned to normal but his blood oxygen (SAT) level had gone way down. They ended up having to put him on 100% oxygen. They are technically not supposed to have him on more than 60% oxygen on this floor. But since he did not want to go to the ICU they let him stay here on 100%.
It was very scary for most of the day. They put him on a pain pump which helped with his back pain but obviously didn't help to clear his head.
They did a CBC and his hematocrit was down to 19 which was way down from 27 the day before. This had never happened before. So they filled him up with red cells and platelets which really helped perk him up a little. By the second bag of red cells he was more lucid and making a lot more sense. His blood pressure was still very low but we got to about 70/50 and his saturation level was holding on between 88-91 (they want it above 90). Things looked a little more stable so we sent all our family home, praying for an uneventful night.
The night went alright. His pressures were still pretty low but holding steady. At one point he was having a hard time keeping his SAT level above 80 which was bad. They called the respiratory therapist and he said we were on as much as we could be on unless we wanted to go to the ICU. Clint didn't want to go so the respiratory therapist came in and talked him through his breathing which made a big difference. He was able to stay around 90 the rest of the night.
This morning his blood pressures finally came up a bit. He is now hanging out around 90/60 which we will definitely take over 64/24 any day! He is still on 100% oxygen but his SAT level has been around 97% for most of the afternoon so we're hopeful they'll be able to turn him down soon.
Clint has managed again to amaze his doctors by still being alive. He is the most amazing man I have ever known and I am so incredibly blessed to be able to be his for eternity!!! Thank you so much for all the prayers. They are felt more than you know and are an incredible strength to us. We are so blessed and once again are just thankful for each day our Heavenly Father blesses us with. Please keep the prayers coming for Clint. We love you all!