Moving day.

This was the day Alan moved to the new hospital. He was one of the first kids transported that morning. He was the first patient in the CICU!

A Flights crew from Kansas City came out to help with the move. They packed Alan up in an isolette and loaded him up in the ambulance. Unfortunately there were space restrictions and so no one got to go along with him. Mom and Dad followed in the car from the old to the new hospital. It was quite the operation. All the kiddos got brought over one by one in the ambulances that day.

The move went smoothly and Alan got to his new unit safely. The new facility of Children's Hospital is much nicer than the old. Its pretty and clean and spacious and has rooms for the families.

It was cool being the first kid over there.

Alan was pretty cozy in his new bed. He spent his second weekend at the hospital hanging out waiting for his surgery.

First Snuggles

Kangaroo

One day after going out for a walk, we came back to Alan's bed to a suprise... he was being extibated (getting breathing tube out). This was a perfect opportunity to do some Kangaroo Care (bare skin chest to chest holding that is proven to be medically beneficial to the baby - apparently its what kangaroos do).

It was nice to finally see our handsome little boy's face. Oh and here was when binky first got introduced. He has switched to a slightly different style since but Alan and Binky have been attached every since. It looked so huge when he was that tiny.

First Feeding

Here was Alan's first tastes at the bottle. He had breastfed immediately after birth but hadn't gotten around to any eating during several days of NICU drama and being intubated.

NICU days

Alan spent his first week in the NICU at Children's being kept stable until a surgical option could be considered. He needed to stay on blood thinners to keep his Ductus Arteriosus open - its a connection between the pulmonary artery and the aorta in the fetus that normally closes up after birth. His first few days he had to stay intubated (with breathing tube in) to control his apnea spells until a proper dose of meds could be reached.

Alan had lots of visitors. Both his grandmas and grandpas were there with him lots. His aunts and uncles all came to see him - Derek and Claire and Luke and Jaime and Lacey and Jacob. and Cousin Cammie and lots of friends - Kristin and Sarah and Rodney and Mary and Henry and Pastor Aram and Pastor Erik and Debbie.

He had lots of great nurses taking care of him but it was a very scary time.

The diagnosis

Alan's diagnosis was Pulmonary Atresia with intact ventricular septum. Above is a beautiful drawing by Dr. Steve Goldberg who is absolutely the best. Here is a good link to find out more:

http://www.pted.org/?id=pulmonaryatresia1

In Alan's case, his pulmonary valve, which is where blood exits the right side of the heart to go to the lungs was completely blocked in utero. This made his right ventricle, which pumps to the lungs underdeveloped and pretty much useless. To treat him , the plan was a 3 stage surgical process to ultimately leave him with a Fontan circulation, which would leave him with one functioning pumping chamber of his heart.

The first stage, the BT shunt would be performed right away. It is a tube between the subclavian and pulmonary artery It was a temporary measure to give him some circulation to his lungs until he could grow big enough for the next stage.

He went to the heart cath lab his first week to get checked out further and to have his atrial septum opened up. Alan was born right before the hospital moved to their new building so scheduling his surgery was difficult. He didn't get his operation until about 10 days old in the new hospital.

September 20 2007

This was the day Alan came into our world. The day started at midnight. Jenna woke up to her water breaking and shouted some expicatives. Got up and spent 4 hours watching Ghost Hunters while contractions began and then headed off to the hospital. A pretty uneventful birth process and our 5 pound; 9 1/2 ounce little buddy made his appearance around 1:30 pm.

We spent a couple hours feeding and snuggling during his awake and alert time. Then we let him go off to the nursery for some of his initial care while Jenna slept off some epidural and Rob got some much needed food.

Here's what he looked like fresh out in the world.

And here he is all cozy bundled up!

As the afternoon progressed though Alan started showing some symptoms. His complex CHD (Congenital Heart Defect) was undiagnosed prenatally. It was finally decided that he would be transferred to Children's hospital that night. Very scary for all - Rob accompanied Alan in the ambulence and Jenna stayed behind to be discharged first thing in the morning. At Children's, Alan had a rough go of things the first night and ended up intubated. Cardiology spent a good amount of time that first night and the next day with the ECHO trying to diagnose him and come up with some treatment options.