Getting So Big...

Any minute now Adriana will be rolling over! It's crazy that she is already almost 3 months old, smiling, coo'ing, and playing. Addy has never once acted like she was anything other than a normal, healthy baby. A passerby would never know she has congenital heart defects. She really is amazing and not to mention a VERY happy baby! I am excited for many more milestones in her life!<3<3<3<3

Hooray for Fall!

We all went to the pumpkin patch on Friday! After a quick tractor ride and a romp through a corn maze, Tateum and Cameron picked out their pumpkins for carving/painting!

I was also able to snap & edit a few fall photos of Adriana being cute as usual ;)

Finally.

While Tateum and Cameron were with Daddy in California this past week, I've been able to cuddle Addy a little more and get some things done around the house! Finally, I can claim victory over Tate & Cam's room. It's all painted, organized, and clean! I was also able to clean out the walk-in closet in their room, paint it, and turn it into additional toy/play space.

Party Hardy!

Tateum's 4th Birthday Party was this past Saturday.  She and her friends had a blast:

Growing Baby Girl

Addy is now 9 pounds, 10 ounces and her oxygen saturations are still around 90%!  She has also grown to 23" long! Things continue to look hopeful--our plan is still to wait until 4-6 months of age to do heart surgery.

Happy 4th Birthday, Tateum!

Good News...

Adriana's oxygen saturations went up again!  She has gone from 85 to 90 to 93!  We are very excited, especially because this past week she has had a cold.  It's encouraging to know that it did not affect her in the least!  Addy is now 8 pounds, 13 ounces and eating "like it's going out of style", as my mom would say ;)

This past weekend we also attended the Air Show where Daddy works at Martinsburg Air National Guard Base:

A Visual of Adriana's Heart

Matt, the kids and I attended Addy's cardiology appointment today.  Good news--on top of steadily gaining weight (she is 8 pounds 2 ounces now), her oxygen saturations went up!  She is now back up to 90!  Anything under 95% is still described as a "blue baby", but her body will cope well until saturations drop below 80.  When it drops (later down the road) we will consider beta blockers, and then the plan is surgery between the age of 4 and 6 month--as long as her tissue obstruction in her pulmonary artery does not call for  an earlier intervention.

I have attached a drawing of Addy's heart that I copied from Dr. Baker-Smith.  She is almost 100% convinced that both VSDs will need to be closed, but the ASD should not affect her.  She predicts that the obstruction, if it does not worsen, should only need "patchwork" for the pulmonary artery to function properly.  A shunt is most likely unneeded (cross your fingers), since the annulus of the pulmonary artery is of sufficient size for blood flow.  Again, that would mean the one surgery would suffice, and Adriana could move on with her life as a normal child, save for a few routine cardiology check-ups throughout her years.

VSD = Ventricular Septal Defect
ASD= Atrial Septal Defect
Purple Arrows = mixing of oxygen-rich and oxygen-poor blood

American Girls

God Bless the USA

Appointment with Dr. Baker-Smith

Dr. Baker-Smith is our assigned pediatric cardiologist and she is absolutely AMAZING.  She's very upbeat and caring as well as brilliant.  Adriana sees her once a week for routine checks.  Luckily, her office is in Westminister, MD and not in Baltimore.  Although it takes an hour and a half to get to her office, distance-wise it is actually closer (and more scenic) to us than Baltimore.  Also, it's nice not having to pay $7 for parking for every single appointment!

Today Adriana received an ultrasound of her heart, her oxygen saturation was checked, and she was weighed.  She is now 7 pounds, 11 ounces!  Her goal was to gain 15-30 grams a day, but she is actually averaging about 38 grams daily!  Her goal for eating is between 2.5-3 ounces every 2-3 hours:  She has been eating 3-5 ounces every 2 hours!  This is extremely important because the bigger Addy is when she goes in for surgery, the better.  It is very encouraging that she has developed such a "talent" for eating, because that will make for an easier recovery as well.  As for her saturations, they have dropped, but not by a significant amount.  Dr. Baker-Smith says that she will put Adriana on beta blockers next week if her oxygen level drops any more.  The medication will slow her heart rate, giving her ventricles more time to fill up with oxygen-rich blood to go out to the lungs.  This will buy time for her to grow and fatten up before having surgery.

Since Addy has been born, her heart has changed a great deal.  She still has two ventricular septal defects (VSDs or holes) as well as a hole between her atriums--hence the mixing of oxygen-rich and oxygen-poor blood.  She also still has double-outlet right ventricle, meaning her two valves are pulling from the one ventricle on the right (they should be pulling from opposite ventricles).  However, the concern before was that TOO MUCH blood was going to the lungs and not enough to the body.  Well, our special girl decided that she was going to form defenses inside her pulmonary artery to slow blood flow to her lungs.  Her cardiologist worries that she developed a little too much obstruction in that artery, unfortunately.  Because of the change in her physiology, this affects surgical options.  Surgical option #1 is closing one of the VSDs to make sure her two arteries pull from different ventricles and then doing some "patch work" in her pulmonary artery to allow more blood flow.  These are straight-forward procedures with great statistical outcomes.  Option #2 would be closing the aforementioned VSD, and installing a shunt in her pulmonary artery to allow more blood flow.  Like the other procedure, the installment of shunts is relatively common, and statistics are promising.  However, if Addy's heart requires a shunt, she will have to endure other surgeries down the road to install bigger shunts as she grows.  Obviously we would like to avoid that.  We hope that option #1 is viable, and it will be Adriana's only surgery.

The hole between her atrium will not affect her, and the second hole between her ventricles will most likely close on it's own.

I hope that I haven't confused anyone!  Basically, it's a "wait and see" situation, as before.  We cannot wait until we can put this all behind us and move on--we have no idea when that will be.  Surgery could be a few weeks or a few months from now.  Until then, we will be fattening her up... and she is not opposed to that ;)