You've Come a Long Way BABY.

Last night Garrett’s nurse was one that also had him before his repair surgery.  She told me she was his nurse during the night he almost had to go on ECMO (baby life support).  I knew there had been talk of him going on ECMO.  I am just glad that, first and foremost, we DID NOT NEED IT and secondly, I wasn’t around when the doctors where considering putting him on it.  I probably would have just fallen apart.  Once on ECMO, there is only a 50% chance that he would have been able to come back off of it.  The nurse told me he took a turn back towards the ‘better’ and the doctors obviously decided he did not need to go on it after all.  Talk about dodging that bullet – barely.

I guess the nurse telling me about how close Garrett was to going on ECMO made me really examine where he has come from THEN til NOW.  He has had to fight to live from the day he was born.  Garrett has to work for his life – with every breath he takes.  He only has ¼ of a left lung.  He has a misshaped heart.  He almost needed life support before he had been on this earth for 24 hours.  I look now at a sleeping miracle in his room.  He now wears no oxygen.  He eats from a bottle.  He stares at a mobile over his crib and makes baby noises.  AND, one of my favorite things is that he crys – it is so wonderful to be able to hear it.