Our Lives Forever Changed

I don't know if I've ever written about that day specifically, because at the time, I couldn't talk or write about it.  I was too devastated.  I don't feel devastated anymore, so here we go.

I remember that day four years ago like it was yesterday.  I know what I was wearing, what I was thinking..everything.  I was so excited to see my little baby on the ultrasound.  Scott and the boys came with me, they were excited too.  We had chosen not to find out the sex of the baby again, because its just more fun that way.  The boys were worked up and wild.  They could barely hold still as the ultrasound technician showed us our little baby.  After a time, she grew quiet, and the ultrasound took forever.  We didn't really notice since we were in the process of trying to keep two small boys quiet and calm.  When she finished she instructed us to go back to the waiting room and the doctor would call us back soon.  We did, but by this time the boys were sick of being still and quiet so Scott took them out of the office into the hallway to play.

I was called back to see the doctor alone.  Instead of taking me to an exam room I was taken to her personal office and she placed a box of tissues in my hands.  I was confused, I didn't know what was going on.  She said calmly and quietly that they thought there might be something wrong with the baby's heart.  I was stunned for a moment.  I just sat there looking at her.  She said that they weren't experts but there was definitely a problem.  The information began to process in my brain and the tears came.  She asked if I'd come to the appointment alone and when I said no she asked the nurse to go find Scott and the boys.  She sat silently with her hand on my shoulder and I sobbed while we waited for Scott to arrive.

When Scott walked in and saw what was going on, his smile immediately faded and he asked what was wrong.  I told him about the baby's heart.  He seemed stunned too.  He didn't say much, but he didn't cry.  The doctor told us that they'd set up an appointment with Maternal Fetal Medicine (the high risk doctors) department for later that afternoon, where they'd do a level 2 ultrasound to confirm a heart defect and then after that we'd be sent over to see a pediatric cardiologist who would perform a fetal echocardiogram to give us a diagnosis.

We walked out of the office in shock.  I couldn't talk, only cry.  Scott was still very quiet.  After we buckled the kids into their car seats, Scott wrapped me in a warm hug for several minutes while I wept into his shirt. We then drove over to his office to tell them that he wouldn't be back that day.  Scott went inside for a while and when he finally came out I could tell that he had been crying.  He told me that Russell (his brother and boss) wasn't there, so he'd called him to tell him what was happening and said that he and his wife, Collette were on their way over to pick up our boys so we could go to the rest of our appointments alone.

After the boys were in the loving care of Collette, we headed back to the doctors office to meet with the Maternal Fetal Medicine doctors.  I had finally gained some control over the crying, but its absence left a big headache.  The doctors did a very silent ultrasound (they instructed us not to ask questions until it was finished).  It took a long time, and before we could ask questions they decided to look over everything and discuss it together before telling us what they thought.  They left us alone in the room for a long time.  Scott and I both fell asleep (it had been an exhausting day).  They finally came back and told us there was no mistaking the heart defect, although they couldn't tell us specifically what it was.  We also met with a genetic counselor to try to figure out where this came from, which was inconclusive.

We met with the pediatric cardiologist, Dr Womack, a few hours later.  He was very nice and understanding, and we liked him right away (he was wearing a charlie brown tie and red converse shoes, and we could tell he was a fun guy).  He preformed the fetal echo which also took a very long time and when he was done he showed us what he suspected.  He told us that the left side of the heart was severely underdeveloped and that the aorta was either extremely small or pinched off all together.  The baby also had a condition called heterotaxy in which other organs where affected.  It was too early to tell but he suspected the baby had multiple spleens (known as polyspenia) (turns out he was wrong about this, the baby had no spleen, known as asplenia, which is still part of the heterotaxy).  He said that there was also a chance the baby would have Down Syndrome (which she did not).  He instructed us to NOT go home and search the internet, as it would only scare us.

After our marathon of appointments we headed to Russell's house to pick up the boys.  While there, Scott and Russell gave me a priesthood blessing, during which we all cried.  That night, we looked up all the symptoms on the internet (against Dr. Womack's orders) and found a condition called Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome.  Despite the doctor not giving us this specific diagnosis, I knew this was what the baby had, and he was right, it did scare me.  I was devastated.  I cried a lot for many weeks.  I turned off my phone and stopped talking to people for a while.  I don't know why.  I just didn't want to talk about it.  Looking back, I guess I should have handled it differently, but at the time, it seemed logical to just shut everyone out.

Our lives changed forever that day, but not for the worse like we thought.  We got our beautiful, tough little girl out of that horrible situation, and we wouldn't have it any other way.  Scott and I grew closer together as couple, and grew a closer relationship with our Heavenly Father as well.  Ivy has enriched our lives in so many ways that I know wouldn't have happened without this challenge.  We are so grateful for her and all that she's gone through, and that we still have the pleasure of her company in our lives.  I will never forget how I felt that day, but I am glad that I can look back more positively now.  Heavenly Father doesn't give us challenges that we can't handle, and though at the time, I felt like I couldn't handle it, I did and everything turned out okay.  Remembering our past challenges is helping me get through our upcoming challenges for the next several months, and I know that we will get through it all okay.

If you're still reading, thanks for sticking with this long post.  Have  a good day!