Home Sweet Home

We are home! It is beyond our comprehension, but yesterday we were discharged. Braden has done so well that the team of doctors decided it was in his best interest to go home and to allow his heart to grow a bit more. Surgery has been rescheduled for December 9. The VSD (ventricular septal defect) is larger than we realized. If his heart is allowed to grow, it will give the doctors more to work with in making that repair; the VSD will remain the same size. This is still a good thing though with the Transposition of the Great Arteries because his blood is getting the oxygen it needs through that large VSD.

We will be meeting weekly with a Children's cardiology team while back home waiting for surgery. Even though it was scary leaving the hospital with a newborn needing heart surgery, we are beyond thrilled to have Braden with us. Can we just say how incredibly awesome it is to have all the wires and monitors off our precious baby boy?! Every time we held him, some beeper would go off because a monitor patch had come off his chest or his heart monitor slipped off wherever it had been placed at the time. His IV is out and the bandaid on his head is the only reminder of where it was.

While still at Children's, we were able to spend a lot of time with Braden once he was moved to the floor, Tuesday the 11th through Thursday the 13th. It was certainly different than NICU (neonatal intensive care unit). He was in a HUGE bed and shared a room with a teenage boy. We had great nurses, but it just felt so strange to have a newborn in that room, looking so small and helpless. It was hard to leave him there. Darth and I took turns sleeping overnight with him, but of course one doesn't really sleep in the hospital. We are pretty much exhausted.

Now that Braden has been discharged, our girls have been smothering him with love and kisses. They beg to hold him all the time; he is in great danger of being spoiled. Oh well. It was fun to bring him in for bedtime prayers with the whole family. We are blessed.

It is hard to think of having to head back to Seattle for surgery, especially so close to Christmas. Darth and I just keep saying, this is God's thing, not ours. He has had his hand on us from the beginning and we will continue to walk in faith and trust and to hold on to what we know is true. And in the meantime we keep praying for that miracle healing, though we admit we have seen huge miracles in the way things have gone even this far. Braden is just doing so well!

Please keep praying!

Darth and Jenni