Miss Doctor Jean

 

That is what J calls his cardiologist. 

We went in for his 6 week checkup on Wednesday and to discuss his surgery.  I was pretty nervous.  I knew this was coming.  The truth is that I kind of convinced myself that he had improved since being home.  He hasn’t been blue in a while.  So I wondered if he really needed the surgery…but I knew he did.  Tuesday night I went in his room and prayed over him.  The first thing I did was dedicate him to God.  I told God that I wanted J’s life to glorify Him and I asked Him to help me accept whatever came in his life.  I also asked Him to guide us in any decisions we needed to make for him.

So we went to the clinic where our doctor sees him.  Our nurse, Linda (who we LOVE), came to the waiting room to get us and it was so nice to see someone we knew.  We stopped to get his vitals and other nurses were stopping by to say how cute he was.  After a few bizarre oxygen level readings, we came to the conclusion that his has not changed.  We didn’t think it would have, but we always check.

Miss Doctor Jean said that this surgery will help make his quality of life so much better.  He will have more energy and stamina.  So the next step is to have a heart cath done.  They will put one in up by his neck and another one in through his groin.  This is so they can get a good idea of what exactly they need to do.  At the same time they will do an ultrasound.  He has spleen activity, but they aren’t sure if he has one or multiple spleens. This is basically an exploratory adventure.  She wants to keep him overnight to monitor him afterwards and she said it will give us a test run of the ICU.  After they have the results his case will go to a meeting of all the cardiologists and surgeons and they will come to a decision on what exactly they need to do and how they will do it. 

His surgery will most likely be the first of June.  She wants him to have plenty of time to heal before he starts school (a 5 year old program) in the fall.  She tried to prepare us for what we would experience.  She said he will be in the hospital for a week to 10 days and after that he will not feel well for another 2 to 3 weeks.  It will take his body time to get used to working with more oxygen.  Then she told us what to expect when we first see him after surgery.  He will be on a ventilator.  There will be multiple tubes coming out of his chest.  He will also have blue wires coming out of his chest that are connected to his heart so that they can control how it beats (like a pacemaker).  He will also have draining tubes coming out of his side.  Yes, the thought of seeing him like that makes me tear up.  Our doctor is so great though.  She said she will ask the nurse to cover him up for our first viewing and slowly roll it down.  Our case is special all the way around.  His insides are so complicated.  He should have had this surgery 2 years ago so they aren’t sure exactly how he will respond to all of this.  Most parents who go through this surgery with their child have already seen their child like this because they have had surgeries like this since birth.  I feel very confident in our doctor and the staff at the hospital.  They are very interested in him and helping him.  They are just so helpful.

They also told us to go on our vacation before the surgery.  He has been begging us to go to the beach so we got that booked today.  No swimming or sunshine for him this summerL.

So the doctor visit was very informative.  Of course I’m scared…very scared.  But I feel a great peace about all of this from my faithful Father above.  We knew before we even saw his picture that he had a broken heart that would need to be fixed.  We also knew that it needed to be loved!  This will be his first surgery with parents and I’m so blessed that I get to be with him.  I know God is going to do something awesome with him.

Please pray for us as we prepare for this next road on our journey.

Katie

Easter!!

We had a wonderful Easter. I have to admit that I wanted it perfect. This was his first holiday here in America and I wanted it to be amazingly perfect. My sweet husband kindly said "well, you know it won't be!" I really knew that wasn't the most important thing, but I still wanted certain things to go certain ways. And overall...it was...perfect.

Upon approaching Easter, I was thinking about how we were going to handle it. You know the whole Easter bunny thing and all. I wanted to do something a little different. I wanted to start our own tradition and I wanted it to focus on the true meaning of Easter. Before I even had a chance to tell B and research it, he came to me with an idea.   Lenten Lights by Noel Piper.  We both didn't really know how it would work with him.  Would he pay attention?  Would he get anything out of it?  But it was really great!  He loved it.  I don't know how much he really understood, but he asked some awesome questions.  Like "what does obey mean?"  What?  We had been telling him to obey for weeks!!  We never thought about how he didn't know what that meant exactly!  People adopting toddlers...take note of that!!  He also asked what it meant to listen to God.  It was really great.  Next year we might tweak it a little to take it down to a little bit lower level...but we might decide not to do that.

We had our annual Easter Egg Hunt at church and it turned out very well.  We had to teach him what to do, but he got the hang of it.  It was just a joy for me to have my own child at an event I helped put together!

We went to my parents' house Saturday night.  It was so much fun!!  He had his very own egg hunt and he got to play with remote control cars for the first time.  He loved it and did very well with the cars.  We also rode in the back of the pick-up truck!!  He was SOOOO excited about that.  And he went fishing for the first time!  It was a fun time, but we really missed my brother and sister!!

So Sunday morning came and I did of course have an Easter basket.  There was no talk of the Easter Bunny though.  I have NOTHING against the Easter Bunny.  I love pretending!  But since he had no idea who that was, we just left it at that.  We told him he would have a surprise the next morning and he was excited about that.  I think the thought of a giant bunny coming to his house would have scared him anyway!  The basket had a few of his favorite things in it.  Mickey Mouse stuff, gummy bears, magnets, and a small Build-A-Bear (he loves that place).  I also went to my stash of toys in the attic and got one of the games we have had for a while for him.  He and B played it last night and he loved it.  I also had some candy for B!!!

We had a wonderful lunch at B's parents' house and yet another egg hunt!  He is good at those now.  He had a blast.  There were balloons and a little kite flying as well.  I'm very excited about some pictures I got that I'm not going to share because they are going to be presents for some people!!

We also went to visit my Grandmother.  And that night we chilled at home.  He slept 12 hours Sunday night!!!  This was our busiest weekend yet, but it was also one of the best.

If you think about us tomorrow morning, please pray.  We have another cardiologist appointment.  We will talk about some future procedures and his big surgery for this summer. 

Hope you had a wonderful Easter celebrating the death and resurrection of our Lord and Savior!!

Katie