No news is good news

It's been quite awhile since my last post.  There seemed to be nothing new to report regarding Isaiah's health, or perhaps I was just avoiding composing a post, as it would force me to think about Isaiah's heart problems.  In between check ups I find myself almost forgetting how serious his medical problems are.  We have fallen into so much of a routine of administering his shots and his oral medications, that they no longer serve as strong reminders of his situation.  However, as the date for his echocardiogram check up came closer and closer, I found myself thinking about Isaiah's aneurysms more and more and my anxiety level steadily increased.  A few days before his echo, I was watching a KD-related video online and ended up in tears.  The little boy in the video had suffered from KD, but despite a large delay in receiving treatment, he was fortunate enough not to end up with any long term effects.  Photos of the boy brought me back to the awful days of Isaiah's hospitalization and a feeling of despair washed over me. Why did Isaiah fall into the small percentage of KD survivors that end up with aneurysms?  It was the first time, in a long time that I cried over Isaiah's condition.

On Wednesday we headed down to SickKids for Isaiah's check-up and clinic visit.  He is so used to going there now that he calls it "my hospital."  He even makes a game of guessing what level we are going to park on.  As always, the time during the echo was full of anxiety.  Mike and I stared at the screen, trying to make sense of the images and measurements without really knowing what any of them meant.  When the sonographer finished her report, we had to wait while she had the cardiologist sign off on it.  She was gone for quite awhile and we worried that there was something wrong.  She eventually returned and told us that we could go to our next appointment. The wait between the echo and our actual clinic visit with Isaiah's nurse practitioner was an excruciatingly painful one.  It is difficult to balance preparing for the worst and hoping for the best.

As it turns out the echo, blood work and ECG were all good.  His heart function is fine and the echo did not indicate any clots or changes in size of any visible aneurysms.  Although we are always hopeful for some improvement in the size (ie. lessening) of Isaiah's aneurysms, at this point we are happy with no change at all. Yay!  Perhaps Isaiah's condition has stabilized for now.  While we continue to hope and pray for improvements in Isaiah's health, we will always be grateful for the wonderful life that he is living now and will use these cherished moments, as a source of strength to overcome any challenges that may lie ahead.

Isaiah doing some post-echo gaming.