The visit

We did good. Here's how our day went at Primary's:

I took Nick straight into cardiology and explained why we were there and while we waited for them to figure out who we were supposed to see, who should appear in the hallway but Dr. Cowley himself! He snuck up on Nick (who had his back turned) and once he had Nicks attention he loved on him a little with some big hugs and kind words. It was a good way to start the day.
Once we had some plans for our next steps, we went to register. Dr. Cowley walked with us and asked us to page him later if we ended up being sent home.=)
Next we took Nick into be examined by the EP team and to have his ICD interrogated. It turns out he had 2 "events" on Saturday. In the bigger one his heart rate was about 353 beats per minute which continued for 18 seconds.(Yikes!) They did a quick EKG and some other routine exam stuff, and soon we were sent to go have an echocardiogram done.
The echo took a while, which bugged Nick. The tech would leave for a minute to see if she needed any other pics, come back and take more and then leave again to see if there needed to be MORE pics. Nick got really frustrated with that and told me that when HE's the Doctor then HE'LL be the BOSS and he'll say "Don't take ANY MORE PICTURES!" =)
After the echo was another small exam. (it seemed a little redundant, but hey, do what you need to! Lets just take care of this kid.)
Then we were sent up to Same Day Surgery to check in. They decided to take Nick into the Cath Lab for a Defibrillator Function Test (DFT). It's not a procedure where they open him up. He had an IV and in the procedure they cause his heart to fibrillate while he is under anesthesia and they are there to supervise. They use a computer to kind of "program" the ICD and check it's perimeters and "energy" output. I don't know (and don't really want to know) how many times they did it, but I know that they had to make Nick's ICD shock him to set these perimeters and see at what levels it worked. The whole procedure took about an hour.
Then there was recovery, and a quick page to Dr. Cowley. Just as we were about to be discharged Dr. Cowley came in with his sweet secretary Barbara to say goodbye. He brought Nick a cute Elmo balloon and 2 of his favorite candy bars. I was so surprised. I thought it was such an "above and beyond" gesture. We are so blessed.
Nick was kind of a twerp~ he was still a little groggy from the anesthesia, but he hardly said a word to the doc and just sat there changing channels on the TV, kind of ignoring everyone. As the doctor was leaving though Nick yelled out "I LOVE YA."

So, to sum it up, the results are kind of like this:

We're not changing anything. We're going to try to keep going the way we have been and pray that he doesn't have more "events", but if he does, try to be thankful that the ICD is doing its job and remember that it is saving his life.
He's doing pretty good for the most part-- even though we still have concerns and some issues. He's a walking miracle and living proof that God can do things that man says are impossible.

What's the deal with holidays?

Nick has been at the hospital or had weird things happen with his heart on holidays a lot. We've spent 2 Thanksgivings, Easter, Valentines Day, Halloween, and we just BARELY missed spending Christmas at Primary Childrens Medical Center. He has also had his defibrillator shock him on Leap day and on St. Patricks day. Something is weird.

We may get to spend THIS St.Patricks at PCMC too.

We're headed back to SLC tonight and are going be taking Nick to PCMC tomorrow to be seen. Yesterday morning his heart fibrillated enough to need a "therapy" shock from his ICD. Luckily when he passed out he didn't get hurt too badly. He just hit his eye (on the floor?)but it isn't too bad.
When we spoke with the cardiologists at the hospital they instructed us to bring him back down Monday. They weren't able to schedule an appointment, but they want him there and they said they WILL work him in. So. We'll see. He's really done a great job for the last year. The last known shock he received was March 17th of last year! His heart fibrillates ALL the time. Several times a day, but it has generally been able to correct itself before the device is needed to correct the problem. We've been very fortunate. Hopefully this trip won't be a BIG deal.

I'm beginning to think that subconciously Nick likes to be at the hospital for
holidays!

Wish us luck!

This weeks Little Guy Quotes:

"You're always trying to tease me with bacon!"

"Are we rounded? Not like on Star Wars the Clone Wars when Annikin is surrounded, but are we rounded?"

"Mom's always know if you do bad things, like eat your goobers."

"Do those missionaries know that WE know that Jesus is good?"

"I don't want to catch the leprechaun, 'cause he's a good leprechaun... maybe he can just give us his gold..."

"You're rich if you get to eat dinner."

Very happily says the following
"Fine. I wont have that pudding."
(Then stomps away and says over his shoulder) "That makes me SO mad!"

Messy fun!

Here are some pics of a few of our recent fun little messes! More to come I'm sure! I just borrowed a book from the library on all these cool things for your kids to make and do, so hopefully we'll get even messier! And believe me, we're gonna have fun doing it too!



This is Paul's Class "pet" -- Little Bear. He gets to go home with one student each night and they are to write a paper on all the things they did with Little Bear. We decided that it would be fun to share some popcorn with Little Bear.
You should've seen all the popcorn on the floor! .. Well, I take that back. You definitely should NOT have seen that.




This is Nick's "buddy" from Primary Children's. It's his FAVORITE stuffed toy. Since Paul was getting to share popcorn with his friend, it was only fair that Nick could do the same!


And of course, if the older 2 were having a party, Andrew wanted IN! So, he brought Ernie out to play too!



Here's some play dough fun...


I was really surprised at how long the little guys stayed interested in it!


Ah. Markers. And a piece of bread. I should know better by now than to leave them alone for more than as many minutes as they are old!


"Oops-y."
(Yeah RIGHT Silly Smurf. Like THAT was an accident!)


And then there's Drew, who just started laughing... which made Nick laugh. You can see Nick laughing in the reflection of the mirror. *sigh* Those 2 little mischief makers!


The GOOD son. LOL He's so great to help me. He was putting the markers away for me while I tried to clean up smurf fingers.


This is the Banana-Face snack we made today,



He totally got his head bit off! LOL

Is it bad I had to trick Andrew into eating a banana by gluing M&Ms to it with Peanut Butter...?

A Laugh

Saw this and had to save it. Picture Nick as the litte boy on the examination table.



Be kind of cool if it did though.... =) That is exactly the kind of thing Nick would ask too. He is always trying to figure out how much he can get away with!

(For anyone who doesn't already know, Nick has a defibrillator/pacemaker, and has quite an "imaginative" sense of honesty. Granted, he is only 4 and is probably on schedule for the fibbing, but he can sure tell some whoppers!)