May is an amazing month

Brad and I were out running errands this afternoon, on my day off from work, and something dawned on me. Tomorrow, May 18th will mark 13 years of having a strong and healthy heart! Traditionally I eat green grapes, saltines and drink 7-up all day because after my surgery, that's all I could keep down. I do it every year and I try to be thankful every day of what I can do with a fixed heart. People tend to get confused when they see a scar on my chest. A lot of them ask if I still have my own heart, if I had a stroke (really, at such a young age?) or some just a scared to ask. I think it's a beautiful line down my chest that tells a great story of why I am still here . . . alive and healthy! Honestly, I haven't noticed my scar for years but I used to be very self conscious about it.

Anyway, my mom wrote this email to a teacher many years ago to help explain to the class what was wrong with my heart. I'm not going to change but a few words that she wrote so that those of you who DO read this, will understand what went on with my heart!

HAPPY HEART DAY TO ME!! :-)


Here’s the scoop on Megan’s heart.

Last Thursday Megan had an appointment with a Pediatric Cardiologist (children’s heart specialist) at Children’s Hospital in Seattle. She had been having pains in her chest and heart and her regular doctor wanted her to be checked out more thoroughly. We already knew that she had a heart murmur - lots of people have them and it is usually no big deal.

The Cardiologist listened to Megan’s heart for a long time and decided she would have an Echo-cardiogram. Also known as an ultra sound. It was really cool to watch the technician do the test. Megan can explain what they did. When the Doctor came back into the exam room he said the results were a TOTAL surprise to him.
First of all, he said the pains she described were normal pains that young people between about 4 and 14 years old have. They are connected to growing and hormones. Not something to be worried about.

Next he said that Megan has a passage (a fistula) from the Left Coronary Artery to the Pulmonary Artery ...... where there shouldn’t be one! The condition is not life-threatening right now but will be when she is much older (like 50 years old). To fix this, Megan will have to have a procedure called a heart catheterization, where they will insert a hollow tube into a vein in her groin and then into her heart to look around and see what’s going on. This can also be called an angiogram. If the surgeon sees that everything in her heart is OK and can fix the hole while doing the catheterization he will. If, for some reason, he can’t then she will have to have open heart surgery during the summer to fix the condition.

After Spring Break 1999:
The results of the heart catheterization were a bigger surprise than the echo-cardiogram. The cardiologist talked with us before Megan came out of the recovery room and told us that she had a major, rare heart defect that had been present from birth. The ONLY way to fix it was with open heart surgery. Almost immediately. Of the 300 heart surgeries they do at Children’s each year, they fix maybe 2 like this one. The defect is officially known as Anomalous Origin of the Left Coronary Artery from the Pulmonary Artery. In other words, it wasn’t attached where it should’a been! The LCA kinda leaks into the pulmonary artery - what they initially thought was the hole - instead of attaching to the Aorta. The right coronary artery was enlarged because for 12 years it had been doing all of the work of both arteries. We are lucky to have Megan with us. Usually this is a defect they find and fix in infants because they are sickly and have lots of health/heart problems. Those were never words that described Megan.
What needed to be done was to detach the left coronary artery (LCA) from the pulmonary artery (PA) and reinsert it into the Aorta. In the realm of heart surgery this was a “low risk” “easy fix” - only if you are talking about someone else’s child!

The following is from an email to an adult friend of Megan’s from California, describing most of the experience. You can use all of it, some of it, or none of it for a topic of discussion in your health class. Megan talks pretty freely about this whole amazing part of her life. I know she doesn’t remember some of what happened after the surgery (they plan it that way!).

She amazes me. We call her Megan the Brave. She went into all of this with such good spirit. The surgery lasted about 4 hours with a nurse reporting to us at the "high" points - when it started, when she was on
the heart/lung by-pass machine, when the actual fix was finished, when she was off the by-pass and when they were completely finished with the surgery. The actual reinsertion of the artery only took 20-30 minutes and it was a piece of cake because of her adult size vessels. We got to see her in the ICU about an hour after they finished . The surgeon came and talked to us about how it all went and he was very pleased with her vital signs. He said that sometimes the heart needs to be "primed" with blood, saline or an electrical charge when it comes off the by-pass. He said that Megan's heart just jumped right in and took over with no help what so ever. (Well, maybe just from her flock of guardian angels )

It was hard to see her in ICU with ALL those tubes and wires. She had an IV in both hands, one ankle and the side of her neck, a urinary catheter, a chest drain tube, pacer wires on either side of the drain, EKG
electrodes all over, and the ventilator tube in her mouth. When she opened her eyes, she smiled and gave a "thumbs up" when I asked how she was. What a kid. ICU was a wonderful, friendly place. We stayed there for a day and a half before they moved her to a room. I was able to stay at the hospital the whole time. They really cater to kids and families at Children's Hosp.! Megan felt better as each tube was
removed. Every medical person was amazed with the speed of her recovery. I guess that comes from being healthy and fit. The biggest problem she had in the hospital was with throwing up. The anesthetic
and morphine shut her stomach and bowels down pretty completely.
Eventually she could keep down saltines and 7-UP and she said they never
tasted so good!

The surgery was Tuesday morning and we were home by 6:00 pm on Friday. She is moving slowly but improves daily. She's had no pain meds since last Tuesday (and that was just Motrin)....... one week post-op. At that post-op appointment, she had a little fluid between her heart and lung on one side and the heart was still slightly enlarged. They put her on Lasix and an anti-inflamatory. By Friday at the echo cardiogram appointment, the fluid was gone and her heart was still enlarged but noticeably less than before. She goes back to school on Tuesday (! ) Amazing.

The scar. Its beautiful! A long, thin line. The Doc. used a plastic surgery closure not staples, so there is no Frankenstein scar. With proper care and no sun exposure it should fade to barely noticeable!

And that's the whole story. :)

25 will be great!

I had a pretty good day yesterday, lots of wishes and great experiences.

My uncle Denis who lives in Laramie, Wy sent us a birthday card with 50 dollars in it and said to go and have dinner and a glass of wine on him! So instead of a birthday dinner, we had a birthday lunch downtown at Jakes! I enjoyed every moment of it!

I was kind of hesitant to spend my birthday at my new job, all by myself but it was great. There is a new resident in the house that I am at and her birthday is today. So since I am not working today, I brought us both a cupcake and we enjoyed it together! It was nice to be able to put a smile on her face for just a few minutes! It warmed my heart that I was given this opportunity to spend my birthday with her. :-)

I get off work around 12:30am and the drive home takes about a half hour. I walked in the front door and I see my favorite bottle of wine, beautiful flowers and a thank you card from Brad. I was kind of surprised that it was a thank you card (ones ordered from shutterfly ) but he explained it inside. It's moments like that, that I need to hold on to. Brad wrote some pretty loving and sincere words in that card that brought me to tears! I'm a pretty lucky lady to have him in my life!

I've been into reflecting on what the next year will bring Brad and I. I wrote in my new years post about the hopes of what 2012 will bring us, and so I feel like I should talk about what 25 will bring Brad and I. Hopefully it brings us our first home, stable jobs and more friends. We are eager to welcome Tim and Kaley's new little Ireland in September and see where life takes us. I see lots of trips down to Cheyenne Wyoming to visit one of the best women I know. In August and September my mom will be out in Billings for a little bit as she retires from her job as a speech therapist. She FINALLY gets to be a stay at home mom!I think that the year of 25 will bring great things for all of us!

Happy 25th to us!

In our 5 years of dating and 2 years of marriage, Brad and I have celebrated 7 birthdays together and each of them have been pretty unique. As most of you know, my birthday is May 1st and Brad’s is May 5th. So I thought that in celebration of us spending 7 birthdays together and turning a quarter of a century old, I would go back in time and reminisce about what we’ve done and experienced together.

I spent my 18th birthday at home with a few friends . . . most of whom I don’t talk to anymore. Actually, I’m pretty sure I don’t talk to any of them anymore. From the pictures my mom sent me, I had a furry pink tiara and I got a big blingy butterfly ring. It was an all girls party, but my boyfriend at the time(Kevin Nutt) was over for a little bit. I guess a few of us also ended up getting in the hot tub at the end of the night. Honestly, I had a hard time remembering any of this till the pictures reminded me.

Brad’s 18th was spent in Mexico with his best friend Croyle and his parents. It was a trip that celebrated his 18th birthday AND graduating highschool. That’s pretty darn special. Brad had told me that he and croyle sat pool side and just enjoyed the sights. I’ve heard stories about Senor Frogs . . . not really sure. Brad wanted me to include our 18th birthday’s in this blog because it’s the year we met.

Time for a side story . . .real quick.

We met after graduation, in September on 2005. Brad had moved up to Tukwila and was working at the airport. He worked with two guys, Mitchell Gould and Ryan Zimmer, both of who I went to high school with, they were just a year older. So I somehow met Ryan and we started dating, but Ryan and Mitch were good buddies. I was with Ryan one day and we went over to Mitch’s place . . . guess who Mitch’s room mate was? If you had told me 7 years ago that the young man who I met that day would one day be my husband I would have told you that you were nuts! I never looked back! ☺

Our 19th birthday Brad was living in Spokane and was going to spend his birthday weekend all by himself, but I wasn’t going to have it that way. I picked up his best friend, Croyle and we drove the 6 hours from Seattle to Spokane to spend Brad’s birthday with him. It was quite the surprise to Brad when I walked in to his apartment and then Croyle walked in soon after.

Our 20th Birthday I arranged a dinner so that my parents could meet Brad’s parents! My dad wasn’t feeling good that night, so it was just my mom that went and had dinner with us at a Seattle restaurant called Buca Da Beppo. From what I remember it was a strange dinner and I was pretty uncomfortable for the entire thing. Lol.

Now is the big Two One!! It’s a smith family tradition to go out to dinner on the night of the birthday to wherever the birthday person wants to go. I have a very favorite restaurant downtown Seattle called Cutters, so we went there. I got off of work from the Montessori, changed and we were on our way.

After dinner, I met up with my friend Jamesy and her then room mate and we went to Cowgirls Inc, downtown Seattle. Brad was our designated driver for the night. The poor guy couldn’t be involved in any of the fun, but we left early anyway. Ended up dropping off Jamesy and her friend and went bowling with Croyle and his girlfriend Jenny. Brad’s birthday was spent with his parents down in Olympia and they went to a Mexican restaurant where his sister Kate worked. All of our friends had waited till myself, Brad and croyle all turned 21(croyle’s birthday is may 10th ) so we could celebrate together, so that weekend, we went to downtown Bellevue and bar hopped. Oh the joys of being young!

Our 22nd birthday we weren’t able to spend together, but I had a good time for the both of us. Brad had joined the Army by this time and spent his 22nd birthday in the gas chamber at bootcamp. Lucky guy! I was the good girlfriend back home who sent his cards and made sure that no one forgot that it was his birthday too. I spent this weekend down with our good friends Ashley and Raul Diaz. I got one of those recordable cards for Brad and I sent him a sweet message. Everyone else had a somewhat generic card to sign for him and it was in the mail!!

Our 23rd birthday, we were married and in Billings. This would be my first birthday away from my parents and in a new home with my husband! Holy smokes, we grew up! Christine, Esther and then little baby Jadon came out and spent our birthday with us. Christine took us to Old Chicago for dinner and spent a nice weekend with us. We didn’t really do anything more special than that because we didn’t know a whole lot of people out here in billings, so we couldn’t throw a big party or anything.

I hope that we always remember our 24th birthday! Brad and I were in Ireland last year to celebrate a few different things. First and foremost, Brad was on his two weeks of leave while being in Afghanistan for a year. We hadn’t seen each other in 8 months, so these two weeks were pretty much heaven. We also never got a honeymoon, so this Ireland trip was celebrating that along with our 24th birthdays! The one part that I will always remember was the Irish bar that we went to some how found out it was my birthday and the entire bar, along with the accordion player, sang happy birthday to me! ☺ A girl couldn’t ask for more! Brad’s parents stopped by in Ireland on their way to Israel so we got to see them for a day or two and they were in Ireland on Brad’s birthday.

I’m having some trouble with this year’s birthday because I’m not really where I thought Brad and I would be. Not to say that I’m not excited about where we are in life, I just thought we’d be further along. We aren’t doing anything special this year for a few reasons. We couldn’t get anybody together at one time because all of our friends are so busy and Brad’s birthday happens to be land on drill weekend! Haha! So since I have to work till midnight tonight, Brad is taking me out to a birthday lunch at a nice restaurant on the west end of town. I got a nice package in the mail from an amazing friend Nicole, thank you for the kitchen stuff! I love it!

I guess since I have no other choice but to turn 25, I should embrace it. Its not really THAT old. I’m excited to see where the next 7 years of birthday takes Brad and I and what we experience.
Happy 25th Birthday to us!