Jersey's Surgery Update...

Heidi is getting some much needed rest so I decided to give an update on our little Jersey's surgery. We sent her off at 11:15 am and got her back at 9:45 pm. It was a very long day for Heidi and I to say the least. We would get periodic updates but we spent most of the day in agony waiting to hear the outcome of the surgery.

At about 9:30 pm our surgeon came into our room to explain what had happened. He explained that he fixed the issues with the heart. He repaired the VSD (hole between the right and left ventricle), put in a donor pulmonary valve and trimmed the pulmonary arteries (they were blocking her airway). He said that overall the surgery on the heart went well and that her heart function should be good.

Then the bad news. He explained that her major issue is her lungs. Her airway didn't develop properly thus making it very difficult to breathe. The airway is much smaller because the pulmonary arteries were blocking it while she was in the womb, inhibiting growth. He explained this will be something we will need to deal with for "a while". Now we were prepared for this, but not to this extent. She will need some breathing aids until her airway develops more, and only time will tell.

The doctor also explained that she is coming back from surgery with something called an Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO). What is an ECMO? This is a special procedure that takes over the work of the heart and/or lungs when they are too sick to properly support the body. The ECMO machine basically acts like a heart. This is where her blood will go to be oxygenated and sent to the rest of her body. This machine is very similar to the by-pass machine used for open-heart surgery. Very scary to think our little baby’s blood needs to be run through a machine before it gets sent to her little body.

Once our doctor explained all this we were pretty much in shock. We were both heart broken to hear the severity of everything, especially the lung issue. But nothing could've prepared us for what she was going to look like post surgery. Anyone who has had a baby have open heart surgery knows what I'm talking about. When they wheeled her in my heart sank. She looked like she went through 15 rounds with a professional boxer. She was swollen, beat-up, bruised, cords everywhere, IV’s everywhere, etc. She was surrounded by an army of doctors and nurses to help stabilize her. We just stood there not knowing what to do or think. One of the nurses suggested we wait in the waiting room until she had been stabilized. We took her advice. We waited until she came back in and explained everything in greater detail. She prepared us for what we will be going through for the next several weeks/months. Hopefully we are semi-prepared.

Right now she is attached to every machine imaginable (ventilator, ECMO, heat, drugs, nutrition, etc) and is being closely monitored by three nurses. They told us these next few days will be critical. In about 24 hours they will hopefully start weaning her off the machines. Once this happens we will just have to wait and see how she responds.

I'm sorry for the rambling, but I wanted to be as detailed as possible. We also wanted to thank everyone for their thoughts, prayers, blessings, babysitting, dinners, phone calls, text messages and cleaning (special thanks to Mandy, gross). Our families have been AWESOME, too! Heidi has been a trooper throughout this whole thing and I want her to know I love her very much. Tatum and Tucker have handled the chaos very well and are anxious to get their baby sister home. Last night Tucker prayed that Jersey would get all her cords off so she could come home. They are going to be the best big brother and sister!!!

We know Jersey is a special girl and we can't wait to hold her in our arms. We know with the help of Heavenly Father she will recover and be home before we know it.