Like nothing ever happened...

When we had our consult with Dr. Mendeloff before the surgery he told Jase and I that he thought we would be most shocked by how quickly Reese recovered from surgery. Wow!, was he right. Reese acts as if nothing ever happened to her. She gets on her belly, is trying to truly get the crawling thing down, moves her arms all around. Other than having a big scar, or zipper as we call it, down her chest and Jason and I scooping her up rather than lifting her under the arms, you would never know the kid had open heart surgery. We are so thankful. Here are a couple of pictures of her right before we left the hospital...
(this is the first time she wore clothes in 5 days)

We have been so blessed by the way people have cared and loved on us through this entire thing. We had 6 people from church staff at the hospital at 6am to pray over Reese before surgery (plus, Jason's uncle who drove in from Corpus and his mom). All the grandparents came in and helped with the big girls and everything else. My dear friend Paige joined us before the surgery and stayed until I was released from the ER (no snickering please :0) ). My best friend, Rachel, from Waco drove in for the surgery. We had a lot of my students at the church, youth leaders, friends, etc. who prayed around the clock from Wed. night through Sunday. My mother-in-law, Melody, stayed until Friday to help me with things (and she got a huge hug for treating me to a cleaning crew too). Since the Wednesday evening before surgery we have had meals dropped off each night for our family, and this continues through this entire week. Can I tell you how easily I could get used to this? Our big girls have acted like champs through the entire process. Laney and Reese's school provided a big basket full of drinks and treats for the hospital. Our friend Rusty came with a ton of baked goods during surgery. We have received flowers and stuffed animals. My brother, sister-in-law, and nephew came up this weekend to check on us, and treat the girls to fun toys. Truly, people have been exceedingly gracious. Thank you to any of you who have been a part of this. I could go on and on...

I promise in the next few days to post about other things in our life, as well as put up some fun family pictures our friend took. Good night, friends!

We're home!

I'm sure I'll write more later. All glory to God...we are home! We left the hospital around 4:30 today and as we pulled out of the parking lot I began to cry. For over a month I had to continually push back the frightening thought of bringing my precious Reese to the hospital and maybe not returning home with her. But in God's graciousness, we brought our baby girl home today. Thank you for all your many prayers...God not only heard but answered!

Reese @ the Hospital

Just catching up with Mom and a little light reading.

Bonked hard after the surgery.

"That's me, just being a good little trooper while this nice lady behind me beats on my back every 4-6 hrs while smiling & laughing with my mom."

Reese has really learned to appreciate the greatness of the over-sized balloon.

"Yeah to me, I totally rocked that hole in my heart!"

"Here I am with Dr Mendeloff...not sure why everyone is calling him by the wrong name...who is this "McDreamy" anyways?"

"Mom, watch how fast I can yank this out."

"Just getting into anything I can...pretty sure that means I'm healed."

Done...but still here

Well, we are still here @ the hospital but Reese is officially done with what needed to be done with her. Dr Mendelhoff came by this afternoon & took out her chest tube, then Kim took her to get one last sets of x-rays to make sure that the heart looks good & everything has been taken care of.

Reese was most excited about getting her chest tube out & now only has ports in one hand & both feet. Our nurse will be taking out the lines in the feet today & they will leave the one in the hand alone just in case Reese needs something else.

We are scheduled to get out of here tomorrow even though the doc said that Reese would probably be fine if we left today. Since we just were able to take the chest tube out today, he'd rather just place it safe & have stay in an extra day.

I am offially signing off, this will be my last post. Let me just tell everyone how much I've enjoyed working with them over the years...whatever, Kim will take over from here. Pics are coming next.

Jason

Out of the ICU!!!

Good news, Reese was allowed to go to her "normal" recovery room this morning. Her belly was really bloated as a result of the anesthesia but that is very normal for anyone who has to go under during surgery. The personel were waiting for her to finally dirty her diaper & she complied around 1am this morning.

Kim stayed with Reese in the ICU last night but both were able to get a decent night's rest. Since she has beeen in her regular room, her personality is returning to normal. We've been playing with stuffed animals, playing hide & seek, & she is loving her new balloons that were sent to her room. We have gotten her to smile finally but she still does not dig seeing the nurses & dr's come towards her.

Kim & I have been able to hold her regularly but we get pretty tangled up in all of the lines, tubes. etc. Our cardiologist came by this morning to check her diaper count & see how her belly's doing, he is very happy with the results. He said that the surgeon should be by sometime today to take out her drain tube. Doc said that once that is out, she will feel 100% better than she does right now.

Listen to me going on & on, I'm starting to sound like Kim.

Thanks for your prayers, gifts, meals, etc, we have been truly blessed to share this "experience" with each of you.

An update

Sweet Reesie is doing well. She definitely isn't her self, but she's on her way. We are still in the picu, but only because her poor tummy is so distended and uncomfortable. Please pray she'll be able to have a normal bowel movement soon to relieve her rock-hard tummy from its discomfort.

The girls got to come up and see her today which was really good. I've gotten to hold her most of the day...that was heaven. Jason just left not long ago. Oh, it is so hard to see your baby hurting. Plus, any time a nurse comes near her she starts crying and yelling. (I do have to say that Medical City Children's Hopsital has been wonderful. They are truly a caring staff, great at what they do). Please keep up the prayers for Reese. It means more than you know.

Reese is doing so well

We ended up both going home to sleep last night.  Yesterday, after coming outof anesthesia, Reese would get so upset if Jase and I were there but couldn't hold her.  It was heart-breaking.  We are back this morning and she looks phenomenal.  She isn't sedated any more, although still on pain meds.  She hasn't had to be on any medicine for her heart.  They say she couldn't be doing any better.  As I type, the nurse is taking even more lines out of her.  She has had a pedialyte and when I go back in after this I can give her a sippy cup of breast milk.  They are planning on moving her to a regular room, out of the picu, later today if everything continues to go so well.  God has been so loving and gracious through all of this.  Please, please continue to lift our Reese up to the Lord. Today will probably be a tough day for her.  I can't wait to be able to hold her.  Thank you so much for praying.  We have felt the prayers.

2 girls in the hospital now

one day Kim will look back on today & laugh...probably won't be tomorrow though. Kim didn't fare so well when we were looking @ Reese in the icu. Reese appearred to be trying to take out some of her tubes/lines & Kim thought that she was in pain & down she went...Kim sat in the chair & basically fainted.

Kim is doing ok...she is recovering downstairs in the ER with a couple of bags of fluid in her until she gets her legs back under her. ER doc just wanted to run some tests just to make sure but he thinks it was simply too overwhelming for her, lack of sleep, anxiety, etc that led to the episode.

Reese is attempting to wake up...she has just a normal O2 tube in her nose & is still sedated as she is trying to wake up. Nurse says all of her numbers/readings are all perfect.

keep you posted on 2 of my 4 girls...keep your fingers crossed that my 2 @ school had a normal day (both grand-dads had to get them ready for school this morning).

jase

DONE!!!...almost...

Ok...Reese has everything covered up, closed up, stitched up & working on its own. Doc came up & said everything looked real good, everything went according to plan & there were no hiccups along the way. We have yet to see Reese but she is currently in the PICU & we are just waiting for maybe another hour @ the longest.

Obviously this is not written by Kim, this is dad...sorry it's short & to the point but hey, I'm a dad & my little one is safe again.

I'll let Kim update more when we get to see Reese

Off of the bypass machine

The nurse came out and said that the patch is sewed in the heart and everything looks really good. She is off of the heart/ lung bypass machine and her heart is beating on its own. PRAISE THE LORD! They will be doing an echocardiogram on her and if everything looks good they will close her up. I'll be back soon.

Love,
Kim

In Surgery

The nurse just came out a few minutes ago and let us know that everything went well with the anesthesia. Dr. Mendeloff is now in and cutting her open and will then get her on the bypass machine. It will probably be close to an hour and a half until we hear anything again. We are in some pretty critical time over the next 2 and a half hours so please keep praying.

Handing her off was so hard but she did well. I have only competely lost it once. We have a pretty large crowd here in the waiting room which is helping us to not be so anxious. Again, thank you.

Much love,
Kim

Holding Hands

"For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear; I will help you." Isaiah 41:13

I like to hold hands. Even as an adult I would hold my mom's hand if we went shopping at times. I love when I hold hands with my daughters. Ashlyn and I have a code...we squeeze each other's hands 3 times to say "I love you." My heart beats a little faster, even after all these years, when Jason entwines his fingers with mine. And I can tell you that over the past two days I have very much enjoyed holding hands with My God. (Jeiccy, thank you for the verse)

I have felt a truly heavenly peace these past two days. And when I am unable to hold Reesie's hand tomorrow, I know God will hold hers for me. Please pray for all of us, especially Reese tomorrow. We have to be at the hospital at 6am. They will take her from us around 7 or a little after and put her to sleep to prep her for surgery. This should take a little over an hour and then Dr. Mendeloff will begin the surgery probably between 8 and 8:15. Please pray for protection for my baby girl. The nurse will come out every hour or so to let us know what is going on, etc. We will try to update several times tomorrow.

Again, thank you so much for covering us in prayer. I think it brings much joy to the Lord to see His children seek Him. We are so very, very thankful for you.

Much love,

Kim, Jason, Ashlyn, Laney, and Reesie

Meeting with the surgeon

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Phil. 4:6-7

I don't really dig Saturday Night Live at all. However, I do like the newscast thing, especially when they do their "Really? I mean really?" segment. And as i read this Scripture I think "Really? Really, I'm not supposed to be anxious about anything?" I get anxious about a lot of things. But honestly, God's Word is so very true. As I present my requests to Him (and sincerely thank you, Lord, for not getting annoyed by my same requests over and over again), especially with thanksgiving, a peace that transcends worldly understanding guards my heart and more amazingly my mind. So, to You, my King, I will continue to come.

We met with the surgeon today, Dr. Eric N. Mendeloff. The consult went wonderfully. Dr. Mendeloff is warm, friendly, and compassionate (a trait that often is hard to fine in doctors unfortunately). He had a calm confidence but no hint of arrogance. He is extremely good at what he does and I am extremely grateful for that. He walked us through how the heart works, why Reese needs surgery, what he would do during the surgery, what to expect afterwards, etc. I asked him how many of these he had done, and he looked at me reassuringly and said, "I can't give you an exact number, but it is in the thousands." Words that soothe my soul. Even more soothing were the words every parent is desparate to hear in this situation. "I will take very, very good care of her." My baby girl isn't just another heart to him; he recognizes she is one of my greatest gifts.

So, I'd like to present my list of thanksgivings. God has much glory to be received through all of this:

1. How God has made our bodies to work like they do is the coolest


2. God has protected Reesie from sickness and symptoms of heart failure (they had always said her hole was pretty large and today I asked how big. Y'all, Reese's heart is a little bigger (because it is enlarged) than the size of her fist and her hole is almost as big as a dime!....that God has taken care of her so well this far is such a humbling blessing


3. we live in an age where they can actually put the heart to sleep and operate on it


4. she doesn't have any damage to her heart or lungs that won't be reversed


5. we live in a country where medical care like this is a possibility


6. God has gifted doctors to be able to perform surgeries of this kind


7. I am in a city where I can be close to home and my children to have this taken care of


8. we have good health insurance (I know from my friend's little girls open heart surgery that this surgery will cost in the range of $450,000) and can afford to have our little girl taken care of


9. our insurance told us the hospital is listed as an Institute of Excellence for this type of surgery for Reese. Only 14 other hospitals in the country are listed as such, and Dr. Mendeloff is ranked one of the top surgeons for this


10. we have lots of people who care about us and are praying


11. my Dad and Jason's parents will come in for the surgery


12. the chance of something going wrong is less than 1% (music to my ears as well)


13. Reese will be able to live a normal, active, and healthy life


14. the Lord is in control

So while not my first choice in how things would go, my heart has been overflowing with thankfulness to the Lord today. This doesn't mean we don't have to keep praying, God tells us to present our requests to Him. So please, please pray for the surgery to go without any complication and for God's hand to guide Dr. Mendeloff's and for Reese to heal quickly and properly, and be blessed with a long and healthy life. The surgery will be at 6am on Thursday, Septemeber 18th. Please write it on your calendars and pray; put our Reese on your prayer chains, but as you pray thank Him for what He has done already. And from our family, sincere thank yous for praying for sweet Reese Ellery. She is precious to us.

Labor Day Weekend and More

A couple from church gave us some tickets to the Frisco Roughriders baseball game Saturday night, complete with free parking and free food. It was nice for us to all get out together as a family. The ballpark is very kid friendly and we had a blast being outside, enjoying some family time, and meeting up with really good friends from church. Even Reese loved every minute of it.

Today Laney and Reese had their first day of Mom's Day Out. I really enjoy everything about their school, and more importantly they do too! The teachers all genuinely love the kids. They
have great activities for them, and they learn a lot educationally and even more significantly about the Lord. Plus, it's only two minutes from the church.

In other important news, despite my despise of running, I have gotten in two more "runs" since my last post. My friend Julanne (pictured with the darker hair in the middle) ran with me once. I have to tell you, I was nervous because:
a.) she is a runner
b.) her legs are twice as long as mine
c.) she is in shape unlike her counterpart
But Julanne was gracious and didn't even make me feel like I was slowing her down. She
probably ran 5 more miles after dropping me back home. Plus, I made her talk the entire time so it helped the time pass by more quickly.

We meet with the surgeon on Friday so I'll be back to post about all of that soon too. And my tech-saavy husband has figured out how to post some video so maybe in the near future we'll have that for you as well.

Ta-ta for now.

These last pictures are of the girls before MDO this morning. Aren't they too cute?