January 20th Echo

From our first appointment at Primary Children's we knew that we would only have 3 echo-cardiograms until after he is born. Well today is the day for our last one & I am so nervous!

Driving up to the hospital I can't help but think- What if they go back to the original diagnosis?? What if they were wrong the second time instead of the first time? I tried so hard to stay positive but I couldn't help but be very nervous once again for the results.

After about another hour in the Echo room they pulled us aside into the conference room to talk to us about the results. They thankfully tell us that everything is pretty much the same as the last echo :) that it is for sure the right side of his heart that is small not the left & that his heart is now on the left side (correct position) of his chest instead of the right or the center like before. His stomach is still on the right side of his body (supposed to be on the left) so we still wont know what all comes along with his Heterotaxy until he is born.

He said that we can for sure tell our kids that they can see him after he is born, just to make sure that they are up at the hospital soon after birth so they can see him before he is taken away for testing. Although this was a possibility before it was SO good to hear them confirm it so we can finally tell our kids! :)

He said our baby's first surgery will consist of a them putting a band around the artery that goes from the right side of his heart to his lungs. That his heart is pumping too much blood to his lungs & that it just needs to be slowed down a little. Because it has changed so dramatically from before we no longer need to plan on him having his first surgery right away in an emergency type of situation, that he will need his first surgery around 2 months old instead!!! This way he can grown big & healthy before they have to start his series of heart surgeries. :) He said we may be able to take him home with us for a little while, it will just depend on the degree of his Heterotaxy & weather or not he will need surgery to correct anything that comes along with that. Such good news!! :)

After they got done going over everything so we know exactly what to expect from there side of it all after birth, they asked us if we would like to tour both the NICU & the Cardiac ICU. They said that it would be good for us to get familiar with it now before our baby comes.

So we headed up there with the head nurse coordinator. On the way she told that the entire floor was originally just the NICU used for any & all conditions, then as the years have passed they have slowly made a little over half of into strictly the Cardiac-ICU for heart conditions only. So half of it is for all conditions & the other half for heart conditions only. As much as I hated to hear how common heart conditions obviously are, it gave me comfort knowing that we weren't the only ones going through all of this.

She took a through the Cardiac-ICU first knowing that's where we would be spending most our time. As soon as we walked through the doors I was overwhelmed with the most uneasy feeling that I had never felt before. It was so "medical". No doors to the rooms, just glass walls, stainless steel, perfect silence except the sound of heart rate monitors & the smell of bleach. Extremely sterile, yet eery feeling environment. As she walked us through we could see right into most of the rooms, some of them I had to look away so I didn't burst into tears. One of which was a room that for a second I thought was vacant & that they just hadn't pulled it back together yet, but then as I looked closer I saw two tiny little baby baby feet poking out from under all the wires & bandages. All that was visible was his little cap that covered his head & his tiny feet. I about lost it & had to continue walking. Then a little further on she pointed out a room that had a little baby boy in it, not sure the age but I would guess around 2-3 months old. We watched him lay there while his nurse was looking over him, equipment on either sides & covered in wires & bandages. He began to move & cry until the nurse had to put sandbags on his arms to keep him from pulling on his IV's......I lost all control, I turned away & put my head into Jason's chest. All I could think was how are we going get through this?? The nurse was so sweet & talked us both through it, giving us all the information that she could to prepare us for what was to come.