Twists and Turns

Mason has made it up and over another seed bump, another twist and turn in this chapter of our heart journey. Hooray for Mason!

We came home (well, to the RMH) from the hospital this afternoon. Thank goodness for a short 3 1/2 day visit. Mason's viral test and bacterial blood cultures came back negative. His white blood cell count is trending back down towards normal (meaning infection is getting better), his lung x-rays show a slight improvement, and his cough sounds much better. The assumption is that he has some bacterial pneumonia in the lower lobe of his left lung. We caught it in time with the 3 day course of IV antibiotics before it got into the blood steam (when it would have shown positive on blood cultures.)

Frequent infections in Mason's left lung because of his pulmonary vein stenosis is a concern we had going into this transplant, but our doctors here are not very concerned. The frequency should lessen significantly as Mason is able to come down and then off of steroids. And, as we saw this week and quoting one of our transplant docs, it is something "easily treated". I'll take dealing with this any day over Mason in his old state of heart failure and frequent sicknesses that would just about send him over the edge!!!

Going HOME will make keeping Mason away from germs even trickier, but as long as we do our best we hopefully can keep Mason out of the hospital and infection free.

Speaking of HOME, we will get the word on Monday. Mason has a blood draw, chest x-ray, and clinic visit w/ Dr. B. on Monday. If his lungs look good (or much better) and his white blood cell count continues going down we should be able to board a plane and head HOME to Utah within a week.

Thanks for all your prayers and positive thoughts to help Mason get over this bump in the road. I will leave you with this thought for the weekend:

"...our lives are made

in these small hours

these little wonders,

these twists & turns of fate

time falls away,

but these small hours,

these small hours still remain"

~Rob Thomas~

(Chorus from his song "Little Wonders")

Mason's journey has always been full of twists and turns, yet miraculous wonders in many ways. I truly believe Mason's fate is the plan our Heavenly Father has for him, yet He leaves room for our choices along the way. The hardest choices in this heart journey are hopefully behind us.......but certainly more twists and turns lay ahead. All these twists and turns I can handle, for I now have HOPE that many years remain of special small hours with my baby, my Miracle Mason.