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Tuesday, October 15, 2013

postheadericon Harper Day...ONE YEAR!

One year ago this scared little beauty walked into our life.


As you can see, we were all thrilled but our little Harper....not so much!


She was so quiet, 
smiles were hard to come by....

But things have changed!


Once scared....
And now happy!
Our love for our sweet girl is overwhelming.  
She has brought so much joy to our home!


Elon and Harper have become best friends....




And it is precious!

I could not imagine our life without our sweet Harper!


It is amazing what love can do....



Amazing what a family can do....




We are so thankful!
God is so amazing!


Tuesday, October 8, 2013

postheadericon Catching up...

I am so behind on my blogging...but I do not want to leave out the rest of our summer fun!  Here is the rest of our summer in pictures...

Snorkeling for clams with Mimi and Pop Pop in Crystal River, FL





More snorkeling at Anna Maria Island, FL
We always enjoy time with Mimi and Pop Pop!



Then off for more Florida fun and visiting cousins!  Oh how we have missed them... 













We had so much fun.  And I absolutely loved that we had so much family time!

Oh how I will miss you summer.....
Thursday, October 3, 2013

postheadericon Success!

Elon did great through her heart procedure and has completely recovered!

Here is a recap....She was very nervous the day before and the morning of the procedure...she would not even talk (and if you know Elon...this does not happen - EVER).

She would not even look at me....


After we waited the several hours before they were to take her back (and A LOT of prayers being said for her), she started to relax and became very brave and even happy!  I have bragged on Child Life Specialist's before and once again....they are great.  When the Child Life Specialist came in and started to explain everything to Elon, and let Elon see & touch all the things the doctor would use...it really put her at ease!  Here she is giving her new giraffe some silly gas (it smelled like strawberries!).


But Elon's favorite part was riding in the elevator in her hospital bed...


I was so thankful that we were allowed to stay with her until she fell asleep.  By this time she was her normal self and when they put the heart rate monitor on the end of her finger with the red light, she held it up and said "ET phone home"....everyone in the room cracked up!

Then we wait...

We luckily did not have to wait alone.  I really enjoyed the company that came to help pass the time!  Cole's Aunt Mary, Uncle Ken, and Cousin Heather came to keep us company.  Then Grahm came and brought the rest of the kid's so they could see Elon when she woke up.



This made time fly by and before we knew it, it was over and Cole and I were allowed to go back while she was in recovery.

In this picture you can see the red light on the end of her finger -just like ET!


The anesthesia made for a very unhappy little girl.  She cried, and cried when she first woke up.  She had three area's that they went in to get to her heart.  A small one near her shoulder, and both sides in the groin area.  The side that they did most of the "work" she complained about a lot pain.  They gave her morphine and it eventually conked her out.  She needed to sleep off the anesthesia, so this was good.  Once she woke, she would get sick every time she would eat or drink anything.  First day, not fun...but she slept through most of it.

But by the next morning, we were getting some smiles and she was able to eat some and not get sick.  Her tummy would still hurt, but she was just needing to get used to eating again.


We went home the next morning and by the time we got home, Elon was doing cartwheels every where she went!  Can't slow this girl down :)

We are back to all smiles....




Thursday, August 29, 2013

postheadericon And the not-so fun part...

During our beach trip, we had a little incident that led to a trip to the Emergency Room and to us finding out that Elon has a heart condition called WPW (Wolff Parkinson White Syndrome).  We went to the ER because she was getting sick in the morning, would seem to get better, but then would get sick again the next morning.  I started to get concerned about dehydration (she had also said that she was swallowing the pool water from the salt water pool- that's not good).  

Something just did not seem right. 

So I plopped her in the car and took her.


We were taken right back and the first thing they found out was her heart rate was 245 beats per minute!  And then Elon started complaining that her heart was hurting (this was the first time she had said that).  At first, I did not realize how FAST that really was...the doctor was immediately concerned (as well as every nurse that walked past our room and saw her monitor reading 245).  He was not sure that dehydration was the cause.  He told me that dehydration can cause your heart to beat faster but not usually that fast.  He wanted to do blook work, get an IV for fluids, X-rays, and an EKG right away.  The IV was a challenge to say the least....after 8 try's the foot was the only vein they could get.  Elon was such a champ....of course, she did not want them poking her and digging to find veins but no one had to hold her down.  She held completely still.  I was amazed, she cried but laid completely still!
It really broke my heart.  


Once the blood work came back, it was confirmed that dehydration was not the culprit.  There was another cause to what was going on.  The ER doctor was communicating with a Pediatric Cardiologist and a Pediatric Electrophysiologist at MUSC.  They read the EKG and advised the ER doctor to get her heart rate to slow down.  To do this they had to do another IV.... in her neck!  Yikes!!!  The medicine given to slow down your heart rate reacts quickly, they could not put it in the IV in her leg because the medicine would never make it to her heart.  

Here we go again....


Once again, she laid completely still, no one had to hold her down, even though there were plenty of people there that could have...at least 10 people in her room at this time.  It did not seem real.  

Her heart rate went from 245 to 112 in less then 5 seconds...amazing.  She konked out after that!

The doctors put her on a medicine to keep the SVT (Supra-ventricular Tachycardia) or fast heart rate episodes from occurring again. ER doctor advised us to end our trip and head back home to see a Pediatric Electrophysiologist before we did anything else.  He actually called and set up an appointment for us the following Monday.....

She doesn't look too worried, does she???? :)


After a lot of testing....


The doctor has recommended that she have surgery.  Due to the fact that Elon is already showing symptoms, most people with this condition start to show signs during adolescence to early 20's, and the fact that her SVT episode did not stop on it's own, and most likely was going on for 2 1/2 days,  this looks to be smartest solution for her.  If untreated, she would be restricted in her sports in high school and college years AND she would be high risk for Atrial fibrillation.

Why wouldn't we do the surgery???

This surgery is one of the few that can permanently correct the heart rhythm problems.  It will be done through a heart catheter ablation.  With her condition she has an extra electrical pathway in her heart (you should only have one), through the catheter they will locate the extra pathway and then "clip" the extra pathway, this will stop the SVT's.  The doctor will also do some testing on her heart once they get in there to try to learn more.

The catheter is done through the leg and she will only have to spend one night in the hospital.  

So, this is what Elon picked out as her reward for being such a tough cookie!!!  

 

Yes, my daughter wants to be a firefighter...not really what I imagined :)

Elon's surgery is set for September 4th...that's next week!  They have allotted 3 1/2 hours for her surgery, I think this will be the hardest part, I am hoping it will not take that long.  Please
 pray for her and the surgeon.  She seems fine but she also has A LOT of questions.  As mom & dad, we are also doing fine...We have seen children go through much, much tougher things... having perspective can keep your anxiety level down a good bit :)

And, we know who is in control.

We are so thankful that this has been found and that there is a surgery that can "fix" it.  

Please keep our little Elon in your prayers over the next week!





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