Meeting the Pediatric Heart Specialist

It felt like the longest five days of my life leading up to this appointment. Hearing such life changing news just days prior, and having to wait the whole weekend before you could get any clarity on the whole situation was nerve wrecking to say the least. But, we had the first appointment that day, and boy was I ready to get there and get it over with. I wouldn’t necessarily say I had an abundance of questions to ask. I did my fair share of Googling over the weekend so I had a gist of what CHD was. But, as you may or may not know, there are quite a few types of CHD. Some way more complex than others. I took Anatomy and Physiology in high school and at one point I was even a Biology major in college, but I’m going to be completely honest. When reading up on these different forms of defects, I was thoroughly confused. I had no idea what half the stuff was talking about. And, I don’t know about you, but I’m the type of person where I will just keep going and going until I’m at the worst possible outcome there is. Now I’m freaking out. 

So this whole weekend I’m thinking the absolute worst when it comes to the little man. Just plain stressing myself out and that’s not good for anyone, especially an expecting mother. Looking back now, that was honestly the last thing I should have did but as a mother you want to know what’s going on. You want to have all the answers. So now it’s Monday and we are heading up to the doctor’s office. I’m talking it’s a full house! My sister, who I mentioned got married the day before the gender ultrasound, was now here. (She actually drove down that same Wednesday to be with me.) My nephew, of course, my other sister, my mom and my (then) boyfriend all came. Honestly, having so much support from my family is what kept me so strong.

We get there and it’s the usual: check in, fill out forms, copay. Then, my name is called and it’s time to go back. When I tell you this room is small! But, somehow we all manage to fit. Then the ultrasound tech comes in and again the pictures begin, this time though only of his heart because I mean that is what we are here for. She finishes up and about 15 minutes later Dr. Day comes in takes his own pictures and when he’s finished we all move to a bigger room. This is it. The moment we have all been waiting for. He’s about to tell us what’s wrong with my baby, and to be quite frank, I was truly hoping he was going to say it was nothing just a mistake.

I mean a girl can dream. Yeah, no. He proceeds to tell us baby DeMarcus has a single left ventricle from what they can see on the pictures. He explains to us what that could mean for the future. So for sure two surgeries: the Glenn Procedure and the Fontan Procedure. Both of these are very common for babies with single ventricles. And, they both are open heart surgery. Now, there is one more that they do either when the baby is first born or a couple days after he’s born depending on how well the child is doing. Either they go in and put a shunt on the heart to create an obstruction to help the blood flow, or if there is too much blood they go in and put on a pulmonary band. It’s possible that this first surgery can be skipped all together.

Dr. Day answers all our questions and informs us that we will gradually learn more as DeMarcus develops and that he’s available whenever we need him for questions. Let me just say: Dr. Day is the best Pediatric Cardiologist. He is extremely attentive to his families. He makes you feel at ease and has no problem repeating something ten times if you need him too. For him, it’s about making sure you understand everything that’s going on with your child and know that you are just as important in the whole process as he and the team of doctors you work with.

I now had the clarity I needed. Yes, my child has a heart defect. Yes, it was going to be a long, tough process with many doctors’ visits and constant pictures of his heart being taken. But, I was as ready as I could possibly be with my doctors always there if I needed them and my family by my side the whole way. I just knew DeMarcus was going to be okay. This definitely wasn’t how I imagined my pregnancy going or how I pictured my oh so perfect baby when I first got pregnant. But, this was it. This was my reality and my son was still going to be the best thing that ever happened to me and we as a family were going to make the best out of the situation.