stella's story

My poor sister was a week overdue and finally induced last Monday. Miss Stella Grace graced us with her presence around 12:30 am Tuesday (4/5). My mom was in the delivery room and said her APGAR scores weren't great when she was first born due to poor peripheral circulation, but a lot of babies take a few minutes to recover from the shock of birth. She was a whopping 8 lbs, 9 oz and 20.5 inches long. I visited her early Tuesday morning and couldn't get enough of her chubby cheeks and double chin. Tuesday night, Cara and David sent her to the nursery to get a few hours of sleep (as I recommend all parents doing for their sanity...) and that's where the nurses noticed more changes in her color/circulation. Supposedly, she turned purple and then dusky. They started her on oxygen and kept her monitored, attributing it most likely to aspiration, but they started doing tests to rule out anything more serious. Wednesday morning, we got the results of the first echo which appeared to rule out any heart problems and we breathed a sigh of relief. But, the doctor wanted a better picture of the septum of the heart so a second echo was done to be thorough. My heart sank when I got the bombardment of texts and messages that the second echo DID show an abnormality and they were transporting Stella to St. Joe's NICU with anticipation of surgery. Her diagnosis is:

Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Return (TAPVR)

She is currently the cutest and biggest baby at St. Joe's NICU! She is stable. She isn't even requiring oxygen now; they are just monitoring her hemodynamic status. Her oxygen saturations are in the 80% (where a baby without this condition would be in the 90%), but she isn't in any distress. She is receiving nutrition via an umbilical IV. Cara & David are able to visit at the bedside as much as they want and the rest of us just camp out in the waiting room and wait our turn. (Only two people are allowed to visit at once and one must be the parent...) The NICU nurses have reinforced her diva status. Since they can't pronounce her last name, they said she's just known by 'Stella' with no last name, like Cher.

She loves her binky. I think she wants to eat, so she keeps sucking for practice! But, auntie Les took the binky out to wake her up and she kept her eyes open for an hour while I visited! I know, I'm a baby hog and the rest of them let me hear about it. The truth is we are all baby hogs in this family, so Stella's getting a lot of love right now!

I think Cara and David are being incredibly brave new parents, taking each day as it comes, and each change in the plan with stride. Plus, they make one incredibly cute baby!

Cara told me that yesterday when Stella went for a CT scan, the anesthesiologist who sedated her for the procedure, was wheeling her back to NICU and she was screaming coming off sedation. He tried talking calmly to her and giving her the binky, but she kept screaming! But, as soon as he left, she stopped... A good sign for her sedation/recovery Monday. Get ready, OR recovery room!

So, the plan as of now is surgery on Monday morning to reattach the pulmonary veins to their proper place in the left atrium. They prepared us for a long surgery; she will be on bypass and they might need to graft some of her pulmonary vein for the reconnection. We know there will be a lot of prayers for Stella that day from all our family and friends. After surgery, she will recover in the cardiac ICU and Cara and David will be able to stay in the room with her all the time. I just can't wait until she's recovered enough for us to hold her again!

p.s. I call dibs, all you baby hogs!