The Anchor Holds

~~~I don't promise life will be easy, but in the hard times, turn to Me - you will find Me there ready to hold you while your world shakes. I will protect you. I will carry you if you need carrying.
Dont worry about the possible hard times that may or may not come. When they do come, you and I will face them together(Isaiah 43:2). I will give you everything you need. Though you may stumble you will not fall because I will uphold you with My hand(Psalm37:23-24)~~~ Got this from the devotional journal mom gave me called (-Journey-)

Chloe was extubated this morning before the 0830 visiting time. She is doing very well right now. her respiratory rate is staying between 50-70. which is a lot better than the other day. still want it to be around 30-40s though. but its an improvement. and she's not struggling lik eshe was before. her oxygen levels are great. her blood pressure and heart rate are good as well. they are going to do another echo tonight. so we will see how that looks. she had a new heart medicine started today. Digoxin which helps the heart rate, the strength of the heart, and the cardiac output. they said they would also start a medicine called enalipril. enalipril will help prevent chloe from going into heart failure and help the symptoms as well.

So everything is looking great today. and we will just manage symptoms for as long as possible before they have to go in and fix something else....either tightening the PA band or fixing to hole in her heart.

We love yall and thank yall so much for the prayers.
The Anchor Holds.
John 10:33

Please keep those prayers coming

Chloe started having a lot more difficulty breathing tonight before the 800pm visit. She was breating about 100 times a minute and oxygen levels dropped to the 60-low 70 range and lower at times. Sadly she did turn a little blue. well any blue is too much blue for your little baby but anyways. So they reintubated her and put her back on the ventilator. she is on room air. the ventilator ws to just help manage her respiratory rate and cardiac output since there is a lot going on with her heart and lungs right now. so it's hard for her to keep things balanced.
--------saved for edit lol---------
but anyways she is doing alot better now. pinked all up. sats are better. breathing 30 times a minute(well the vent is breathing completely for her right now). her blood gasses are alot better now as well. We are gonna wait a day or so and monitor her, do another echo tomorrow, and keep check on her oxygen levels, and pH level.

So just keep all of us in your prayers. Praise God for his love and understanding becuase it was HE that gave his son so that all of us can have life and have it more abundantly...even in the bad times we can still be joyful.

The Anchor Holds
John 16:33

Gonna have to quit writing these notes lol

First off let me let yall know that everything is fine. CHloe is still doing very good. They did another echo and said that structurally everythign still looks good (besides the VSD being there and having surgery haha) but even those look fine lol. He said her cardiac output and left ventrical are just a little wimpy. which will all get better with time. It kinda broke me a little cause I have been able to be so strong this whole time but I just feel let down cause we thought we were fixing to go to a room and now we have to stay another night in the ICU. just so they can monitor more closely but still just like another knife in the heart to me. I know God is here and with us. I know God is incontrol and that He will prevail. I know that God will get glory, honor, and praise out of our situation. It is just so so so hard. Please pray for strength for Jami and me. Please pray that we will seek God's will and lean on him. So that we don't make ourselves feel like we are alone. Cause we know we are not alone. We know that God is right here with us guiding our every move, word, and even our every breath. Help us to remember that the anchor of God has always held for us in the past and that we will always overcome with God leading us. and that the Anchor of God will always hold forever and ever amen.

As my mom always told me "it's just character building"...and like I said to her everytime "I have enough character". lol
I love you all. thank you agian for yalls continued prayers

Chloe is extubated YAY

Chloe is doing very well. She is off the ventilator and breathing well on her own. She is also off of the blood pressure medicine dopamine. YAY again hehehe. I will add more to this after lunch. I accidently deleted my first note i wrote this morning. haha. so will finish later.

ok so now its a day later lol. I was kinda distracted lol. but anyways...

Chloe has been breathing kinda hard and they increased her oxygen from room air to 30% which they say is very normal after this surgery. We are waiting for the cardiac surgeon to come by to release her from the ICU to the floor. but they have already taken out the art line, and chest tubes. So we are very excited and hopeful.

Praise God for all he is doing.

Chloe's surgery went well

Just talked with Dr. Kirklin, the cardiac surgeon who did Chloe's surgery, Chloe did well and we will be able to go see her any minute now. They had to do a little bit of reconstruction with the subclavian artery(the one that feeds the left arm) and it went well. put the band on her pulmonary artery(artery from heart to the lungs) to decrease the flow to her lungs so she doesn't get fluid on her lungs.

The blood flow had to be interupted to the lower half of the body for about 15-20 minutes so they decreased her temp to the low 90's to decrease damage done to the spinal cord and other organs. This made her heart a little more irritable and the putting the band on her PA sent her into A-Fib and SVT(different heart rhythms) and had to cardiovert her(shock her heart) 3 times. but was just from him aggitating the heart.

She is on dopamine at a low dose(expected), intubated, has an Art line(continuous blood pressure monitor), central line(big IV), 2 chest tubes, and is doing very well. pulses are all great.

God is good...all the time....all the time...God is good.
The Anchor Holds

Took Chloe to surgery at 0830

well should...you know how hospitals are. dont really wanna talk long but surgery should take about 2 hours. then she will be on the vent until she wakes up. because they dont reverse anestesia on babies(they said they arent mean to babies liek they are to adults lol). but anyways she should be on the vent for at least a day or until she fully wakes up. then they will extubate and she will stay in the CICU until she is eating without any respiratory or cardiovascular issues. then be on the floor for another few days. so we should hopefully be home around 4-7 days from today.
keep us in your prayers. and know like we do that God is with us. and his name is being glorified through our situation.

thank yall and bless yall for all your prayers. I will write another note after the surgery is over and we see chloe

How Big is our God?

First of all I would like to say "How big is our God?" well I know he is bigger than one new little family because people are praying in the states of alabama, arkanasas, mississippi, texas, virginia, west virginia, oklahoma, florida, arizona, washington st., tennessee, south carolina, and the countries of Canada, England, Guatemala(Huehuetenango and Guat. City), Portugal, and Hungary. All for one little girl. and the families that we have come into contact with while we have been here. How awesome is that?

Next I wanted to give an update on Chloe. She is still doing well. but the doctors have decided that waiting to do any kind of intevention has no benefit for her. and the risks are too great to wait. so tomorrow, Friday, January 29, at 0830 Chloe will have surgery to fix her aorta and to put a band on her pulmonary artery. she will likely have to have surgery later on on the hole in her heart to fix it. but there is no definite timeline on when that will be. most likely before she turns 1 year old though.

I will write a little more later. it is feeding time for chloe.

Keep her and us in your prayers tonight and esp. tomorrow at 0830-1200ish.

Thanks again and we love yall