Appointment

Meredith had a follow-up appointment today with the cardiologist. After four hours and many tests later here is the skinny. She is doing as well as she can be. Her PA band is tightening (which shows that her heart is growing), she has gained 4oz in the past week, and the condition of her ventricles has been upgraded from fair to good. She is also going to stop taking 2 of her medicines, but I can't recall which ones. Of course, she has retained her major plumbing problems.

-Chip

Not Much Change

Not much has changed since my last post. Meredith is eating – and pooping – on a regular basis and as long as she continues to gain weight at an acceptable rate we will not need to supplement her diet.

We are very conscience of the possibility of her getting sick so she remains on a quasi-quarantine status and we have been enforcing the use of hand sanitizer in our home. What this means is she does not have contact with large groups of people in enclosed spaces (no stores, church, etc), and no visitors to the house that have any signs of being sick or have been recently exposed to sickness. We issue "protective orders" on her behalf against our children who appear to be getting any sort of sickness, they are not allowed within about 5 feet of her until all signs of sickness have abated. It is harder for the younger children to understand, but they are working on it. You may think these steps sound extreme, but I assure you given the alternative (Meredith back in the ICU) they are not.

Meredith goes to the cardiologist this week, I will post an update after that visit.

-Chip

What a Month

It was one month ago today that Meredith made her first appearance in her new body here on earth. Looking back it seems both like it was yesterday and like it was years ago. I will be posting updates after doctor visits. Unless she goes back to the hospital I will not be posting daily until her next surgery. I will, however, try to make some updates on the picture page.

Chip

Home

Meredith went home this morning. Although it is scary, we are glad to have our family all back together again.

-Chip

Wire and Tubes

I stopped by the hospital this morning on the way to work and happened to catch the doctors doing rounds. They decided that today Meredith would loose her pic line (IV), her feeding tube, and her monitoring equipment; in other words she is free! Basically Stephanie will just take care of her in the hospital today (her nursing continues to improve) and if all goes well Meredith will go home sometime tomorrow.

This will begin a whole new adventure as our lives will never be the same again. Of course we will be worried that she might drop dead at any moment, although the doctors have assured us that is not likely to happen. We will also have to basically set up a quarantine at the house - no visitors with any sign of any sickness can be let in. Due to her heart condition she will be very susceptible to any illness and will likely require a hospital stay to help get rid of anything she catches.

Big Thanks

I just wanted to take moment and recognize some of the people who have been unbelievingly helpful over the past two weeks.

Our biggest thanks goes to everyone who prayed, fasted, put Meredith on their church prayer lists, and generally appealed to some sort of a higher power to help Meredith recover as well as help the rest of our family deal with the stress associated with Meredith's condition. It is only through God's grace that Meredith is doing as well as she is today.

Special thanks also goes to my family for all of their support, especially my sister Kim and mother-in-law Toni, who took care of the business of running our household (no small task let me assure you) so we could spend time at the hospital with Meredith. Thanks also to the Kaysville 11th Ward, for making sure there was plenty of food in the house and helping get my kids ready to start school. Thanks to my boss for being so understanding and giving me all the time off I needed. Finally, thanks to Cris, Leslie, and Shelly for helping us to finish unpacking the basement and children's rooms.

So may people helped in so many different ways and we are very appreciative of all the help that has been given, even if I forgot to mention it specifically.

-Chip

Counting Down the Days

Meredith is continuing to improve. She is currently taking the same medicines at the same dose as she will when she comes home. Her nursing stamina is also growing, which is a very good sign indeed. The cardiologist said that at this rate of improvement she could come home as soon as a couple of days. This weekend I have spent with the other children and Stephanie has been camping out at the hospital. We are very much looking forward to living as a whole family again.

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-Chip

Got a Room

Today Meredith was moved to the floor and has her own room. It has a nice a view of the valley, a television, its own bathroom, and most importantly, it is right next to the nurse's station. Nobody was willing to speculate as to when she would get to come home, but we at least know that she is closer today than she was yesterday.

-Chip

Tweaking

Meredith is still doing ok after her little episode yesterday. She has an infection and is being treated for pneumonia, although they have not confirmed that as a diagnosis. We also found out yesterday that Meredith also has an ASD. This is like a VSD but in the atriums instead of the ventricles. Apparently many people have one without it being an issue. Hers has become more pronounced as her left ventricle is now working harder to pump the blood past her pulmonary artery band. The main thing holding her back from going to the floor is her high respiration rate. Once this is under control we should be going to the floor.

-Chip

Rough Times

This morning Meredith was doing ok so they let Stephanie try and nurse her. She nursed for a short time and then Meredith was just too wore out. About this time her stats starting getting worse, they have been having trouble controlling her breathing rate, and they decided to do a CPAP. This is a thing that sticks in the nose and forces air down into the lungs. Well that really pissed Meredith off and her stats started getting even worse. They even had the intibation cart ready just in case she really went south. Finally they went back to giving oxygen via the nose (like you see on folks in the movies) and all settled down. Meredith will not get to try nursing again for at least 2 days.

The good news is that her lungs are sounding better - not great, but better.

-Chip

Getting Better

I am back at work today and will be posting on Meredith's condition with information from Stephanie. Meredith is doing about as well as she was yesterday. She is up and down but overall she is going up. Her white blood cells are up, but there are no other signs of infection. Nonetheless the Dr. is going to put her on some antibiotics. She also continues to have some crackling in her left lung; they are trying to control this using diuretics. Meredith had an echo cardiogram this morning and everything looked as expected (I can't really say ok since her heart is still very messed up). The band on the pulmonary artery is a little loose but that will give her some room to grow. The cardiologist said that she may get to go to the floor (out of ICU) tomorrow or the next day.

-Chip