Cindy's first Post operative visit with her cardiologist revealed a large collection of fluid in the sack her heart sits it. The medical term for this is a pericardial effusion. Cindy was prescribed ibuprofen to reduce the fluid. The ibuprofen worked wonders, on Cindy's next visit to her pediatric cardiologist (pc) all of the fluid was gone. We are still giving her ibuprofen to keep the fluid from re accumulating.

Cindy had a quickie echocardiagram at each (pc) visit. Her PC thought he saw a narrowing in her right pulmonary artery during the quicky echo cardiograms. She will need to have a more thorough sedated echo so the pc can get a better look. Her sedated echo will be on November 13th.

Does it ever end? I thought I would be done going to PC's and worrying about Cindy's heart after this last surgery. Sure she still has a bicuspid aortic valve but I was told that it would not cause any problems until Cindy is in her 60's. Now Cindy's surgeon says it may be a problem in as little as 10 years. I am so sick and tired of driving to Tacoma to take Cindy to her PC and all the worry associated with it. I'm also sick of seeing my precious baby suffer. So many I.V's so many invasive procedures as the count stands at 23 months of age she has had two surgerys, two heart caths, countless I.V.'s, countless chest x-rays in the painful Pig-o-Stat, countless blood draws and all the usual childhood immunizations

I know there are kids that have had three surgeries by Cindy's age and there are much worse congenital heart defects than hers. But I still feel the urge to rant a little bit.

I just found out that I have a serious but treatable health problem of my own and it adds to my stress level. The health problem I have is genetic and I don't know if I passed it on to Cindy it will be years before we find out if she has it.

The results of Cindy's sedated echo are in. Her right pulmonary artery is stenotic (narrow) it is not stenotic enough to repair. Hopefully her artery will continue to grow as she grows. Cindy's phrenic nerve was damaged during her surgery, as a result her left diaphragm sits up too high. I'm not really sure what that means but I could see it on her chest x-ray. It is not something we have to worry about unless she starts developing pneumonias or tires easily. I'm starting to get the feeling Cindy is not going to be a cross country running star like her mother was.