Parker's Article

There is a man in Chicago who has been working for years to get the American Heart Association to do a campaign for congenital heart defects. He wants commercials, pamphlets, anything to draw attention! The AHA has told him that they will do the campaign if he gets one million dollars to fund it. On February 2, at a museum here in Chicago they are having a benefit to raise money for his cause. We have been asked to help! On each table at the benefit they are going to put a picture and a story of a child affected by a CHD. I have been asked to submit one featuring Parker! I am copying his article and posting his picture here. I hope that the people who read it will be moved by his story to help out! Just an example of how research could help kids and Parker in particular: there is a doctor in Memphis who has just figured out how to do a VALVE REPLACEMENT in the CATH LAB!! No open heart surgery! Imagine if by the time Parker needs surgery again doctors everywhere are repairing valves in the lab! I am really praying for this benefit and for this campaign. A little research can affect SOO many children's lives! Here is Parker's article:




I will never forget the day we found out about our son’s heart defect. I was twenty two weeks pregnant with our son that we had just named Parker and my husband and I were at the doctor’s office for an ultrasound. Two weeks before the tech was unable to see all of the angles of his heart and we were asked to return to “try again”. That was our purpose for being there that day. My husband, Jon, and I were joking about the waste of time and money of this formality. We had heard his heartbeat several times and it was always described as “perfect”. It had not dawned on either of us that there could be a problem. As the tech worked, her face wrinkled up in frustration and she told us she wanted to get the doctor. They spoke to each other over my head in a whisper, maybe they thought if they spoke quietly enough that I would not hear what they were saying. “There is a big hole” “Where is his aorta?” There was suddenly not enough air to keep breathing. There are no words to describe the panic and desperation I felt as I learned my son was not healthy. There was a big problem.
We left an hour later with a picture of Parker’s heart defect. He was diagnosed with Transposition of the Great Arteries and a Ventricular Septal Defect. His pulmonary artery and aorta were switched, his pulmonary artery which should be connected to the right side of his heart, was connected to the left and the aorta which should be connected to the left side of his heart was connected to the right. He had two separate circuits, one that circulated oxygenated blood from his lungs to his heart and back to his lungs, and another that circulated unoxygenated blood to his body to his heart and back out to the body – still without oxygen. His body would not have enough oxygen to live. He also had a hole in the middle of his heart. He would die within days without immediate surgery. As we sat in the conference room with the cardiologist, about to be crushed with fear, sadness, and the confusion of it all, she looked at us and said “this is fixable”. We took a deep breath and smiled.
We spent the next twenty weeks researching anatomy, heart defects, and surgeries. We learned about all of the breakthroughs in cardiac surgery and on January 29, 2007 when we handed him over to the doctors at Children’s Memorial Hospital, we felt confident that he would be ok.
Parker had the Arterial Switch Operation and VSD repair when he was three days old. It was the worst and best day of our lives. Nothing in the world can prepare you to see your child after open heart surgery. It was the saddest, most helpless moment that I can remember. But, the relief, and that is not a strong enough word, of hearing that the surgery was successful, was absolutely overwhelming. No words have ever been sweeter to my ears. With tears streaming down my face, I thanked the man who saved my sons life, knowing how inadequate the words were.
Now, one year later, we have a healthy, busy, precious boy. Aside from the scar down his chest to mark what he has gone through, no one would ever know of the fight he put up in his first few days of life. He is left now with a narrow pulmonary valve that will eventually need another surgery. We have learned from our own experience and the experience of others that our world will continue to revolve around Parker’s heart forever. We are prepared to continue seeking out excellent doctors who are working to perform new surgeries for these kids. While not a day goes by that I do not worry about his heart, I enjoy the place where we are now and I count every one of his accomplishments as nothing short of a miracle. Despite his bad heart, he is, after all, perfect and I could not be any more proud of him.