Kevin and I went to grade - high school together. We started dating my Junior year and Kevin's Senior of high school. Kevin asked me to marry him in May of 2009 and July 9, 2011 we were wed. We decided we were going to not really try and not really prevent after we were married and three short weeks later, we found out we were pregnant with our little Owen. The first trimester was rough, I was on and off pelvic rest because of bleeding and we were trying our hardest to keep it a secret until at least the 12th week, although I don't think we were very good at that!
Then came time for our 20 week anatomy ultrasound, that's when we found out we were having a boy. The tech couldn't get a good view of Owen's heart, which we didn't think anything of at the time, so they scheduled a second anatomy ultrasound for about a month later. Our second ultrasound came around and they still couldn't get a good view of his heart and referred us to Dr. Hayes, a high risk OB/GYN in Green Bay. Again, we weren't too worried, no one had said a word to us about anything looking different, however looking back we now know that "we aren't getting a good view of baby's heart" was code for "I can see the heart, but it isn't normal."
I was so upset and worried that I couldn't think or see straight, what was only 5 minutes of waiting seemed like 5 hours. When we were summoned to his office he had this plastic model of the heart and he said "your baby has a hole in his ventricular septum and will need open heart surgery" It was like a foreign language, I had no idea what he was talking about. He continued to go on about valves and ventricles and blood flow, but I was not processing anything. Then he said they couldn't do anything for us there and handed us a little pamphlet from Children's hospital and their Fetal Concerns Program and told us they would call and have us enrolled and someone would call to schedule an appointment for a fetal echo and an ultrasound.
It was three weeks before we went down to Children's hospital and those three weeks were full of buckets of tears. We finally received some useful information and hope after going down to Children's. We were told that they have a very low infant mortality rate in surgery and that he was going to be at the best facility in the mid west for a congenital heart defect of this stature. They told us that Owen has Tricuspid Atresia, transposition of the great ateries, and hypoplastic right heart. We met with neonatalogists and pediatric cardiologists once a month and we also had weekly anatomy ultrasounds and biophysical profiles until Owen was born.
Since we live an hour and a half away, they recommended that I come and stay with family. I went down to Milwaukee to stay with my Aunt three weeks before my due date. Kevin stayed at home to work. I was still having my weekly bpp's only at Children's hospital. We scheduled them for every Friday so Kevin came down the first Friday I was there. They did the ultrasound and the Dr. was concerned about not seeing much amniotic fluid so she asked us if we could come in on Saturday morning(they are actually closed Saturday mornings so she had to let us in). She did the check and looked at me and said " You are having a baby today!". HA. Yeah right. Owen is so stubborn that he didn't make his entrance for 39 hours! And by c-section too! As soon as they pulled him out I asked if I could have a cheeseburger. The whole not being able to have food thing for almost two days was horrible.
We saw Owen for about a minute after he was born and they took him down to the NICU and stitched me back up and sent me to recovery. After an hour in the recovery room, the nurses brought me down to the mother and baby unit so I could finally get some rest. It was unsure when Owen was going to be having his first surgery until he was properly examined and given an echo. It was decided that he would have the Norwood at 3 days old. I was still in the hospital, so we were able to hang out up in my hospital room instead of down in the waiting room for 8 hours. Everything went smoothly.
Owen spent the first month and a half of his life in the hospital and didn't return(except for appointments) until he was almost 5 months old for his Glenn procedure. We were in the hospital for 5 days and we got to go home! Since then we have been enjoying homelife!
