Friday, June 17, 2011

A few hiccups

Bodie had a cardiology appointment today. An unplanned cardiology appointment. In the world of cardiac kids, any reference to an "unplanned" medical event is never good, and I think an unplanned cardiology appointment is darn near the top of things you don't want to have to experience.

But, well, Bodie is Bodie and likes to throw curve balls. For about the past week and a half or so, he has been getting a little sweaty after being really active. Not super sweaty, more sticky, I guess you would say. Some heart kids are by nature a little (or a lot) sweatier - it's often a symptom of the underlying heart condition. Bodie is not one of those kids. He's normally not diaphoretic at all. And sweating can be a major indicator of heart failure. His eating hasn't been as good lately and his sleep has been a little disrupted. All things that could be teething, a residual response to his MMR vaccine (he's now 16 days out, but the MMR has a longer window to show symptoms), normal toddler fussiness...or, you know, congestive heart failure.

So, you could say it struck some serious fear into mama and a call was put into his amazing cardiologist. He wasn't scheduled to go in until next month, but she squeezed us in. He, like usual, was thrilled...until the pulse ox machine came out. We were able to distract him with bubbles to get a good pulse ox, but holy moly did he lose his marbles with the blood pressure. I mean, the kid would NOT stop screaming. The nurse (who is supposed to get a reading on all 4 limbs) finally gave up after only 1 arm - and that was nothing short of a miracle. Then, she tried for an ekg and he was a hot mess. As fast as she could get the stickers on, he was ripping them off and hurling the leads at her, all the while thrashing, kicking and screaming. She finally gave up. He wasn't much better with Dr. Kim, although he was friendly enough until she and her nice resident tried to listen to his heart. He kept pushing their hands away and saying "bye-bye."

We finally got him to calm down long enough for an echo and got the ekg when he was still relatively calm after the echo. The good news is that his heart function has never looked better!!! Praise God! His triscupid valve leakage is still trace, which is fantastic. His aortic valve, however, is leaking a bit more than it has in the past (it was trace and now it's mild). She wasn't super concerned, but wants to go back up on his Enalapril to see if that helps. She said we'll just watch it and if it does end up needing to be repaired at some point, they might just do it during the Fontan (which is still a couple of years out, hopefully).

So there you have it - whatever was causing the little bit of sweating doesn't appear to be heart function related, which is GREAT news. Bodie decided to celebrate by going on a "Seek and destroy" mission in the cardiologist's office. What kind of terrible parent would let their child do this, you ask? The kind of parent who is utterly exhausted and so grateful that her child is not screaming at the top of his lungs, that's who. Oh, and it wouldn't kill them to babyproof these cabinets, right?
Surveying his hard work...
Thanks so much for all of your prayers for Bodie, as always - we covet them and we know they make a difference in how well our little warrior is doing!
Photobucket

4 comments:

  1. Amy,
    First I have to say I am so happy about his heart function! Second, those pictures made my night. How funny. Not for you of course because I know you were probably stressed beyond belief. Any parent would look at those pictures and totally get it lol. Especially a heart parent! <3

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  2. LOL- go get 'em Bodie! That's what happens when you make a patient wait too long. We should start doing that as adults too when our doctors take too long. ;) So glad to hear all is well with Bodie!

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  3. Phew!! What a relief!!! I have to say the pics of Bodie destroying the office was, not only sweet justice for cardiac kids everywhere, but 100% pure entertainment! O.M.G. I was laughing my rear off.

    Logan has always been the sweaty cardiac kid HOWEVER he has always dealt with heart failure and has been on heart meds since his first heart surgery at 4 weeks old. Any trace amount of humidity/heat and he sweats and becomes miserable. That's why we spend 90% of our summers indoors. If he comes down with an illness of any kind he will also get sweaty. You will usually feel it around his hair line. Praying for you that Bodie is just going to be another sweaty cardiac kid but THANK GOODNESS everything checked out OK!

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