Growing.
This word takes on so many different meanings for me today, mostly because I’m thinking about little Stellan.
We’ve watched and waited to see if he would be healthy at birth, seen him go in and out of SVT [a rapid heart rate originating in the atria], get through his first ablation surgery and many hospital stays. Too many for such a little guy. But thankfully, he is growing.
The reason that’s a good thing is because his SVT is getting worse. His medications are no longer keeping it under control, so they are in Boston for another ablation procedure… trying to burn off the extra electrical pathway in his heart. The one that is dangerously close to his AV node. That’s why his growth is so important… the bigger he is, the further away the electrical pathway and AV node are from each other. They were hoping to wait until he was 4 years old, but are going ahead now – after he just celebrated his 1st birthday in the hospital.
His mom listed off a lot of possibilities on her blog. There’s a 20% chance the surgery will be successful. The other options are things like a permanent pacemaker, stroke and even death… something no parent should have to think about for their child. But even in their fear, they have found their own growth as well.
There is a growth in faith, in putting their trust in a God they love. There has been growth in their marriage, in their friendships, in their circumstances. Jennifer has had to put up with a lot of cruel criticisms directed at her and her husband, and she has grown beautifully during those challenges and shown what only perseverance and love can demonstrate.
And we all have grown with them. We’ve grown as a network of support, we have grown in our own faith and beliefs, the number of prayers being sent up for this boy grows by the day… and we have grown in the knowledge that miracles come in many forms.
They started weaning Stellan from his meds on Saturday so his body would be free of medications for surgery on Tuesday. As I’m writing this on Sunday night, Jennifer’s latest twitter update stated that Stellan has gotten bad quickly, is in ICU and intubated. There is no way he’ll hang on for a surgery Tuesday, so they will be doing the ablation soon.
I’ll do my best to check in with you here and let you know if I see any updates, or you can follow her blog here: MckMama. In the meantime, take a moment to say a prayer for their family.
I’d like to keep the number of prayers growing.
***** Update 1 ***** 11:41 *****
After a really long night and morning, Stellan was just taken for his ablation. He has had blood transfusions, been packed in ice due to fevers, his blood pressure has been dangerously low and at one point they had to bring him back with a crash cart. I can't imagine how scary this has been for them. I'll update again when she has any news on the surgery.
***** Update 2 ***** 1:25 *****
I'm going to paste a link here so you can go to Jennifer's site, she wrote a post and just did the first update from surgery... the ablation hasn't started yet because they are having some difficulty with access points. http://www.mycharmingkids.net/2009/11/shiny-gem.html
FINAL UPDATE
Are you people sitting down?!?!? You know that small, 20% chance they could do the ablation successfully? Stellan was in the 20%. He's out of surgery and SVT free!!! :) You have to read it in Jen's own words... but this, my friends, is what miracles are made of: http://www.mycharmingkids.net/2009/11/its-going-its-going.html