Stephen Jacob

Here is a picture of our new Baby Boy, Stephen Jacob!


I have more at home but these are the pictures I have on my laptop. Again, I'm living at the hospital with Jacob. I wanted to share with you how beautiful our little baby boy is! His older siblings were able to hold him for the first time. I am still trying to upload those pictures but no luck at the present time.

Many Happy Hugs from All of us!

Jacob, Anabel, Joseph, Marisol, Andrew & Mia

Life in PICU

A New Journey.

Today Baby is 14 days old. We have been in the hospital since he was born. When he arrived in this world he was whisked down to the NICU ( Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) There they discovered his heart defect ( TAPVR) and scheduled him for open heart surgery to repair it. We were blessed to have delivered him at a hospital that is renowned for their Heart and Vascular Institute program.

After the successful surgery, Baby went up to the PICU ( Pediatric Intensive Care Unit) He has been here for 14 days. The doctors, nurses, case managers and coordinators are absolutely the best. They have been working with Baby and us as a family. They have been supportive and compassionate. I have literally moved into this floor. I'm here all the time. My grandmother and father come by to watch him so I can go home to shower and spend some time with the older children. My husband comes in the morning to be with me and get all the updates from the doctors when they do their rounds. To find out how Baby has been and if they plan to do the next surgery to repair the paralyzed diaphragm. So far, baby is recovering and they do not feel they need to do the surgery today. Each day is a new day. He is still breathing fast and has some issues but they want to give him time to heal and see how he does.

Today he was moved from PICU to PIMC ( Pediatric Intermediate Care) Which is a step in the right direction. They still have not ruled out the surgery and if they do the surgery, he will go back to PICU for recovery. PIMC is one nurse to two patients. Which is good. He is being monitored and evaluated. A whole team of new people have been added to his recovery program.

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Speech Therapist- she will help evaluate his feeding skills and airway protection

His is currently on a feeding tube and oxygen assistance. He is on level 1 today. Which is great. His feeding tube is ND so until it goes back to NG he will not be practicing with bottle feeding. ** I plan to breastfeed. I am pumping every two to three hours. Doctors are feeding him with MBM ( Mothers Breast Milk) and their goal is to have him feed from the breast sometime later in his recovery. The breastfeeding topic is for a later post! :)

Physical Therapist-will help with development and how his body moves.

Baby's reflexes are good and seems to respond to the therapist quite well. He is strong for his age and being a 3 week early preemie. She is overall positive with his evaluation today.

Occupational Therapist- specialists in his movement and abilities needed to participate in daily life (play, self-calming-family interaction. Also play skills and visual skills.

Baby is going well. Today he was fussy and had a hard time with self-calming. She showed me how to hold him chest to chest. I admit I was worried with hurting him considering his open heart surgery. She assured me he was fine and at this point that is what he needs. I was thrilled to hold him to my chest. He slept for a while and I was on cloud nine! yay!

He still has his original team of Pediatric Cardiac Surgeons and Pediatric Cardiologist. They check in on him approx. 4 to 5 times per day alongside 4 resident doctors per shift.

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The PIMC room is cozy. The colors are purple and green. The room is quiet. The PICU was full of beeps, flashes and constant noises. The room in PIMC has its own bathroom with a shower! Yay! I don't have to go home everyday for that! TV/DVD, CD player ( provided by Bradys' Smile ; will elaborate on that in a later post) Overall a much calmer room and I feel I can see the light at the end of the tunnel towards going home with Baby. PICU is hour by hour and was hard for me to see past today towards the future.


I guess this blog will be the beginning of me talking about this new journey we are on with Baby and having a child with a heart defect (CHD) I have three older kids and I will talk about them also. The family dynamics have changed. Adding a new baby to the household will do that. We are blessed that Baby is part of our lives. He is a tough little cookie and seriously just makes me happy. The older kids are in love with him and very adaptable to the situation. We learn as we go. We are a family and we're glad you're visiting this blog and hope that you come along this journey with us. If you are going through something like this, or have been through something like this please feel free to share your thoughts or experiences. Send me emails or post comments. I am joining local organizations as well as National Organizations. I plan to post blogs daily, several times a day ( whenever a thought pops up) or as often as Baby allows me to.

A very tired and happy mom of four crazy, wonderful kids!

A New Baby Boy!

A new baby boy!

We welcomed our new baby boy on June 29th at 10:05pm.

He came into this world at 7lbs 13 oz. Full head of hair and the cutest little nose!

He was born with a rare heart defect called Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Return
(TAPVR) He had open heart surgery at 14 hours after his birth. He has been recovering in Pediatric Intensive Care Unit ( PICU) since then. His heart surgery is successful. His developed another complication with his lungs. His left diaphragm is paralyzed and causing him to have rapid breathing and there is talk of another surgery to help with this.

As of today he is still in PICU. His heart looks good. His breathing is still fast. He is on oxygen assistance and a feeding tube. I have been pumping breast milk since he was born. I have a freezer full of milk and in need of more freezer space. I will be storing some over at my grandmother's home for a while. They did give him my breast milk at one week of age but there was issues from surgery so they went to a formula with less fat. They plan to return him back to breast milk sometime today or tmw. I honestly do not know when I will be able to breastfeed him naturally.

Yesterday, June 11 I was able to hold him for the first time. I was in awe of how light he was and how beautiful he looked in my arms. My husband came later that evening and got to hold him also. I will post pictures when I can. I am using the laptop at the hospital. I sleep overnight at the hospital and rarely go home.

The past13 days have been amazing. Baby is such a tough little cookie. He has been progressing so well that the doctors are amazed. He is still "critically sick" as they say but is doing well and they are hopeful that his recovery is moving along.

I have 13 days of stories to tell and I hope I will be able to share with you. I am just getting settled into a routine and my train of thoughts are more relaxed. Its been a string of doctors, medical information overload and just running on autopilot. I am blessed to have such a huge support system of family and friends. I cannot begin to thank everyone enough.

I will post more information along the way. Pictures as well.

Today I will get to play with Baby more. and hold him more upright. They tell me it will help his lung muscles and I am all for it!

Bless you and your families!

Take me Out to the BallGame

"Take me out to the ball game,
Take me out with the crowd.
Buy me some peanuts and cracker jack,
I don't care if I never get back,
Let me root, root, root for the home team,
If they don't win it's a shame.
For it's one, two, three strikes, you're out,
At the old ball game."

Fathers Day 2009.

We took Daddy to the Nationals Stadium in DC. I had the kids dressed up in the cutest shirts ever!. I got them down in Florida from Universal Studios. Before anyone asks, I have one more for the new little one due soon. " Thing 4". I love Dr. Seuss and his books. I have read them all to my kids and still to this day I break out in laughter and grins when I read them.

I didn't realize how "big" I was getting until I saw this picture! Whoa, Mama! Seriously? There is another kid in there? I have to give birth again?

At the baseball game, Daddy was sure pointing out all the babies. Their outfits, their strollers, how many times the babies were shuffled back 'n forth between their parents. We laughed so much realizing we were going through this again. He was enjoying every moment and started getting really excited about the baby. We had one small backpack between us. ( for the raincoats) and I was just pondering how many things I'll be bringing with me when we go out with the baby. ( Strollers, diaper bags, toys etc etc..) I know we're blessed with the three older kids. They are excited and they will be a huge help. They have plans for the baby that don't include me and the husband. I wonder if I'll ever see my baby once the kids get a hold of him. *winks*

The day went great. It was sunny and breezy.
Couldn't have asked for a better day.
Couldn't have asked for a better man to be the father of my kids.
I love you, honey.

Forgive me.
This is a test.

To see Family Photos. click here.

http://www.flickr.com/heisleygang/

Happy Fall

Autumn wins you best by this its mute appeal to sympathy for its decay.
~Robert Browning


Its my favorite season of the year! I love the colors and the smells. I love driving down the country roads with all changing leaves and just feel transformed. I love the scent from the bonfires in the backyard. I love wearing my sweaters, sweatshirts and long pants. I miss my soft boots and the many, many , many scarfs I have. I love changing the scarfs daily. The colors and patterns. My scarfs tend to convey my mood for the day. I'm starting to gather a collection of them.

My house is decorated with all things ORANGE! I have the orange fall leaves on my windows.. I have craft pumpkins all over the house. I'm one of those who likes to have the house fit the season. I have orange lights outside. I have orange candles in all the rooms. Now .... I dont want ya'll to think I have this insane orange colored home. I have my brown furniture and with green accents everywhere. I'm totally into brown and green. The colors of nature. Then each season I incorporate the given colors into my brown and green. It works wonders for me.

This blog will be short today but I plan to take the kids for a day trip to visit Shenandoah Mountains and Blue Ridge Mountains. The view is priceless. Hopefully we'll get in a visit to our friends out in the country as well.

I'm still quite new to this. I have thoughts and ideas of what I want to put on my blogs yet I haven't trained my body to go, sit on the computer and actually implement them! I have started reading other peoples blogs and in awe of the range of creativity that is out there. They have ideas and I'm slowly finding my niche. Right now I haven't figure it out but I will...... I'm in no rush. :)

Blogs are beautiful. I'm really enjoying them now. I grew up writing in journals but they were always for my eyes only. Now its a cultural event to have journals for the whole world to view. Its amazing and I'm slowly jumping on the bandwagon!

Till next time.........

Trick or Treat

Happy Halloween!

The kids had a great fun filled day! I was at school all day for their Fall Parade plus helping out in la Nena's class room. We made geese head/hats for the boys. The girls were dressed up in a "pile of leaves" costume. We stapled fallen leaves onto old brown shopping bags. It worked out great! They looked adorable! Papito had tons of snacks as well as crafts. Mamita carved out pumpkins for the annual school fall parade. The school also made it into a math project where they had to measure, weight, count seeds etc. It was interesting. We had many parents come out to participate and help in the classroom parties. I was wiped out! ..........then we came home and got ready for the neighborhood Halloween Block Party.......







The kids came home and they carved pumpkins. The neighbor hosted a Spooky Haunted House and everyone was looking forward to it. The school assistant principal and gym teacher drove by to experience the haunted house! Those who dared to go in...... eventually came out spooked yet happy.


la nena "The Hollywood Starlet" Papito "Star Wars Clone Trooper"



Mamita " Candy Corn Witch"



After hours of walking... yes, the kids wanted to knock on every door in the neighborhood, we settled in for a movie. They eventually did fall asleep...... holding onto their bags of candies!