Memphis, Christmas 2009 3 years after her Ross procedure.

Everything up until Memphis' birth was as normal as ever, till right after she was born. I could hear the doctors counting and was told when she was finally handed to me that she was polydactyl (an extra digit on each hand). We were not overly concerned about the extra fingers as the doctors didn't seem worried either. The rest of our hospital stay was about normal until the last day when her peds doctor came to see her to take care of the one finger that could be removed before we were to go home.  He did a check-up on Memphis and said that she had a small murmur but not to worry, that it was most likely a VSD and would be fine but he would go ahead and get her a cardio appointment as soon as he could just to make sure and sent us home.

Memphis was born on a Friday and we got to go home on Sunday. The first few days at home were fine. Everything I thought they would be. By Tuesday the cardio clinic (Variety Children's Heart Center)  had called and she would be going in that Friday for a check up.  Now I thought that was a little fast for nothing to worry about but guessed that it was normal for them to rush newborns in, so we went about our first week like nothing was wrong.  At the time I didn't think much about how sleepy she was, or the amount she was really eating but by the time we got into the appointment she just didn't seem right and she was not.   I have never been to a echo before but knew that something was not right while i was watching the screen—I just couldn't put my finger on what it was.   After all the tests were done, we were sent to the waiting room till the doctor (Dr. Soni) was ready. When she walked up with 2 other peoplem I could have started crying right there i just knew they had bad news. We went to talk in another room where they told us Memphis had a aortic stenosis and needed to be in the hospital right away and we would be flying to Edmonton in the morning.   I just sat there and cried—it was all i could do at a month shy of 19 with my first baby. I was not supposed to be going to another city with her just a week old.   Within a half an hour everything was ready for her to be moved to the children's hospital across the street and my husband and I got set to calling the rest of our family to let them know what was happening.   Memphis' appointment could not have been on a better day, as we found out when we came back to see her before going to Edmonton. She crashed that night and stopped breathing we are so thankful to all the wonderful doctors that were there to help her, and that made it possible for her to be there when she really needed to be.

In Edmonton we were sent to Stollery Children's Hospital where she under went a balloon valvuloplasty at 10 days old and we were there a little over 2 weeks. We were then sent back home to the hospital in Winnipeg to recover and gain weight before going home just before Christmas, the best Christmas gift we could have ever asked for. After we got to go home, Memphis went back for monthly check ups and med changes and to have her other extra finger removed,  but everything was starting to go well and she was growing stronger, as strong and as big as she could get before we would have to go back for her valve replacement. 

Memphis was doing great and we thought we would have lots of time before going back until the summer of 2006 when she started to slow down when playing. Her appointment was that fall, just before her 4th birthday, when her doctors said that it was time to go back to Edmonton for the Ross Procedure (an operation where a defective aortic valve is replaced with the person's own  pulmonary valve; a pulmonary homograft is then used to replace the patient's own pulmonary valve).  We left on December 6 and the operation was for the 8th, one month after her birthday and the longest day of our lives.   Dr. Ross and everyone else at the hospital were great, very helpful and made us feel like we were still at home—we owe them the world for what they did.  This time, we were only there for 10 days—not at all what I would have thought—and we were even able to take in west Edmonton mall and see the movie "Happy Feet" after the operation. So it wasn't all hospital stay which helped so much, and we would never have gotten there without the help of Variety Children's Heart Center. We got home again just in time for Christmas.   After the Ross procedure, we had a few ups and downs lots of med changes because she was getting sick on them and had water around her heart but it was all worked out over the next few months, and she was ready for school in the fall

Today Memphis is in grade 2 and unless you see the scar on her chest or the bracelet she wears you would never know what she has gone though. She is one of the strongest people I know and she is only seven years old.  We go for her check-up every year just after school starts, and just before we celebrate our heart day (the day her heart was fixed last).

We will have to go back again at some point to change the other valve but that is a long way down the road. We are just living each day to the fullest and are so grateful to all the wonderful people that have help along the way and continue to help.