Waiting on A Little Heart

Lenay's heart is not better. 

But its not worse.

I'm so grateful that its not worse!

She had her sedated echocardiogram today and our doctor was able to get some very good pictures of her heart.  The best pictures yet actually.  It might have had something to do with the fact that she was "drunk" as the nurses so affectionately described her.  :)  Eric stayed in with her while Campbell and I went to therapy, and by the time I got back she was still sobering up, bobbing and weaving, and laughing randomly.  :) 

Her blood pressure is elevated, which is to be expected, given that the occlusial device that closed her PDA is sticking up just far enough into her pulmonary artery to cause a greater pressure gradient.  And her heart appears "thick" but no thicker than it looked 4 months ago.

So where do we go from here. 

We have 3 options:

1) They can do an angioplasty of sorts.  Go in through the groin, expand a balloon in her heart to try and make more room in the artery.

2) Do a more invasive surgery where they would go in, remove the device (which has been in place for over a year and her heart has grown around) and reclose the PDA with a clip instead.  Our beloved doctor referred to this as "tricky" - not a word I like to hear my doctor say about my daughter's heart surgery!

3) Wait and see.

Our doctor is very thorough, and he values his collegues' opinions.  He will bring her case to their conference next week and see what they think.  He has already talked with the surgeon who performed her original surgery, as well as Texas Children's Hospital (they are world renowned for pediatric cardiology) and so far the consensus is to play the waiting game.

I'm okay with that.  Once again, God is teaching me patience through these children.  It's not one of my strong suits, and He knows that.  He is teaching.  We are all learning. 

Learning while we all wait for a little heart to grow bigger.