Archive for July 15th, 2005
seventh
July 15th, 2005. Published under parents. No Comments.
Elizabeth’s tubes that were draining the fluid from around her heart, after her surgery, were taken out today. Also, her iv’s that went directly into her heart were also taken out. But to top everything off, we found out that she has SVT (a condition of the heart that causes rapid heart beat). This is heritary but can be controlled by medications until she gets old enough to have it corrected. At least they were able to find out what caused the problems last night and this morning.
Her nurse tonight told me that she will be able to sleep on her belly some now that the tubes are out and we should be able to hold her soon. It was a busy day for little Ella Bella and she slept for a long time after getting her tubes removed but I was there cheering her on and holding her hands while they removed everything. So for now we shouldn’t be getting anymore surprises and on our home.
sixth
July 15th, 2005. Published under parents. No Comments.
I just wanted to yell “stop” at all the doctors and nurses yesterday. My daughter’s heart began to beat at 260 beats per minute. She had surgery about a week ago for Hypo-Plastic Left Heart, she seemed to be slightly progressing, then yesterday I was standing next to her. We were listening to Mogwai number 8, I remember checking the cd player because I really liked the beat it had. All the sudden her blood pressure, heart rate and all the million numbers that fluctuate on her monitor, began to go crazy. She lay in her tiny bed flat, didn’t move at all. I backed away when the doctor came running in followed by 4 nurses. Before I knew it, I was stretching my neck to look around all the people, to notice that her legs flinched and her fingers were blue. They gave her a drug, forgive me, I don’t remember the name, and it brought her heart rate down. She stabilized her and she was back on the road to recovery when we left yesterday. This morning the doctor called again, she had another episode (for a lack of better term) and they are going to do a couple things that they think might be causing her heart to react this way. I just wanted them to leave her alone, let her move around freely and cry. I have a daily struggle to convince myself that this is the best way for her, we have made the best choice.
I remember when my first son Nicholas died. I didn’t want to hold him or even see him. I did eventually, I knew I would grow old regretting, if I didn’t. The fraction of time I got to know him was so small that I have a hard time recalling it all. Now I grow old with thinking, what if, what if we would have fought. I just want to know, that I will not grow old regretting this and that if Ella isn’t going to be here long that she wasn’t in a unnecessary amount of pain and longing for the touch of her parents. There is no way of knowing. This hope that I search for can’t be given to me by anyone, other than her, I just hope that each day I see her it is restored.