Grant's Journey

PRE FONTAN CATH SCHEDULED: March 11th I certainly hope that he qualifies for the surgery. I will be glad to get that worry out of my mind. I jump every time the phone rings. I will be glad when the surgery is scheduled too.

If you recall reading a few posts ago, we had a cardiology appointment on the 15th. I have to say, I was actually impressed with Dr. Williams, our cardiologist. This time, we walked in and he knew what was going on, and both Kyle and I felt a LOT better about it. Good thing. We need to have some confidence in him for what is coming up. I had mentioned earlier that I wanted to have a 6-12 month plan in mind so that I had time to plan our lives. We definitely got a plan, but not quite on the time frame I had in mind. After seeing Grant's awesome growth (27 lbs on their scale, 27.7 on our doctor's scale), and hearing about some of the symptoms he has (low sats, incredible clumsiness due in part to low sats, blueness, etc.) he told us that it sounded like Grant's body was telling us it was time. I figured we would hear as much, but I still anticipated that we would be looking at sometime late in the summer so Grant could grow and meet that *magic* 30 lb mark that is so desirabl...

In an attempt to recreate last year's CHD photo shoot (go HERE for a blast from the past!) I sat Grant on our bed just after his bath in hopes of capturing some precious images. He paid attention for about 15 seconds, but I was able to get a few of these great shots, so I am happy. I am now remembering how different life was last year with a baby who couldn't run away and climb off the bed! I take these pictures each year around Valentines day in order to spread some awareness of Congenital Heart Disease (CHD). In reality, by joining us and following along with Grant's journey, you are already very much aware of the impact of CHD's in our lives. 1 in 100 babies will be born with some type of heart defect. Many are not as serious as Grant's and go undetected sometimes for YEARS (think of the stories you hear about high school athletes going into cardiac arrests during games for no apparent reason). Many women do not get great prenatal care and miss important screeni...

January 31st is the perfect day to hurry and sneak in a once a month update...right?! Honestly, I really don't mind the slow pace we are at right now. Boring is really nice. January has been good to us. We have all remained healthy which feels like the best blessing I could ask for! Grant has been continuing to make huge strides and his playful little personality keeps us laughing. A few things about Grant this month: -He is 22 months old... that 2nd birthday is so close! -His language is picking up slowly but surely. He will say "mama, na-na (daddy), an-ma (grandma), bum-pa (grandpa), ball," and a few others that are a bit of a stretch, but we can understand him. He signs "more, please, thank you, food, drink, bye bye," and possibly a few more that I can't think of right now. -In the last two weeks, he has gotten really good at identifying animals and their sounds. He can do cows, horses, sheep, dog, duck, and we are working on chickens and other birds. It ...

Merry Christmas from our family to yours! We hope that this season, you had plenty to chew on... Music to brighten your spirits.... And that you were able to take time to ponder the little baby who so long ago gave the greatest gift of all to mankind. We are so very grateful for the magnificent blessings we have seen this year and for the continued JOY that we have in our Savior, Jesus Christ, and in our own wonderful family. Merry Christmas! We hope that you will be greatly blessed in the coming year!

If you check our family blog, you have already seen these fun photos from my photo shoot with Grant last week, but it was probably time for an update to the heart community as well, so we apologize for the redundancy in the pictures! My last post a month ago was just prior to heading into our cardiology appointment which I felt like was kind of a waste of time. It is a bummer to meet our cardiologist at a hospital closer to us where they do not do any testing. Our appointments are basically a chance for us to discuss any problematic symptoms and then be sent on our way until something sounds problematic to warrant driving to Salt Lake for testing. We did finally get some answers regarding our desire to try Melatonin with Grant. His poor sleeping was doing me in. Our cardiologist told us that we could start him with a very low dose and then monitor him for several hours to make sure his heart rate was stable. Grant had no problems and we have used it at bedtime a few times a week for th...

My little Skeleton is taking a quick nap, so I will try to get caught up for a minute! Isn't this outfit hysterical?? Too bad they don't have an anatomically correct for Grant version...that would really be something to laugh about! It has been over a month since I have posted to Grant's blog which I consider to be a blessing as it means that we are in a pretty normal routine right now! It is very humbling to me to see Grant doing so well when there are so many others who have lost their fight with serious congenital heart disease just this week. I have taken moments to squeeze him a little tighter and thank my Heavenly Father for giving us this wonderful time with him. Grant is now officially 18 months old (as of September 20th, so yeah, I am a little behind!) and he is very much acting his age. Our physical therapist commented to me this morning that he thought Grant was completely on track with his fine motor skills and we are close to catching up with his gross motor sk...