Four Weeks Out

It has officially been four weeks since Liv's Fontan.  I cannot believe how quickly and slowly those four weeks seem to have gone by.  This weekend marked the end of her isolation from the public.  I finally took her out for some Mommy/Liv time to enjoy our favorite pastime of shopping!  She was definitely more quiet and withdrawn than pre-surgery.  At one point you could really tell she was outright exhausted, sitting on my lap eating her snacks just curled up into me.  It was so precious.  Being that we're in the middle of a ninety plus temp stretch here in good ole burbs of Chicago, Liv is really needs to be in the AC because of her fluid restrictions.

I think we are temporarily over the struggle with her meds, Brian devised a way to deliver most of her important pills via potato chips; or any crunchy salty food that will mask the bite of the pills.  So far so good, please keep your fingers crossed.  Thursday he'll be taking her to the hospital for her follow up echo and to get her rx for another holter monitor.  The desired outcome of the echo is that her heart function is restored to the levels of what it was pre-Fontan and there's no fluid accumulating in her chest so she can go unrestricted with her fluids.  The holter monitor is the first step in confirming whether or not the arrythmia has also subsided and whether or not we can start weaning her from the amiodarone.  It's less than idea for long term use because of impact on the thyroid, so the sooner we can get her off of it the better.

Miss Liv's personality is coming back in spades these days.  She's very quick to laugh, but also still very quick to cry.  Nightmares are still going on but I think they're spacing out a little better.  Breaks your heart after a nightmare when she wants to confirm she doesn't have to go to the doctor.  Once she hears that she gets to hang out and play, she settles in nicely.  Only two years old but her guard is up and she wants to make sure she gets to stay in the place she's loved and comfortable.