From Savannah’s Facebook group:
Savannah will be going for a heart cath next Tuesday. They are hoping to gather more information about the pressures in her heart and her venous anatomy. This will give us a clearer picture of a lot of her inner workings.
In someone as little as Savannah, this procedure is routine but not without risk. She will have to be put under general anesthesia because she is too young to understand how to lay still with just sedation. This also means she will have to be intubated. It is also difficult to work with the teeny tiny veins and arteries in a baby the size of Savannah, so there is a risk of the doctor causing injury to the inside of her vessels or her heart.
I will be honest, I am scared to death for this procedure. I know it is nothing compared to the heart surgery she will have later, but this is our first “big” procedure, and the information they get will determine a lot….how soon she’ll need some kind of intervention, a better idea of when she might need her initial trip to Boston and if she’ll need the first surgery, and more information about her ability to have a full heart repair down the road. I’m also nervous for her to be put under anesthesia and intubated. They say it’s all routine, but I’m still worried she won’t tolerate it well. No one wants to send their 2-month-old to be intubated, heavily sedated, and put through any kind of invasive procedure.
As you can imagine, this comes with plenty of things to pray for….
– first and foremost, pray that the doctors will do this exploratory cath and find a perfectly healthy heart by God’s grace.
– pray that Savannah will not be in pain. I don’t think I can stand to see her so tiny and hurting, especially when I can’t do anything to help.
– Pray over the doctor’s hands, that they would be steady and and sure and that there would be no complications during the cath.
– pray that Savannah would tolerate anesthesia well, and that she would do well being intubated with no complications. Pray also that she will eat well afterwards, as sometimes the sore throat from the tube makes babies not want to eat. We don’t want her to lose the good eating she’s worked so hard to establish!
– Pray she would stay free from any infection from the procedure or from anything she encounters in the hospital
– Pray that she will have no trouble in recovery or during healing with excessive bleeding, blood clots, or other complications.
– Pray that they will find that she does not need any current interventions or surgery and that the pressures in her heart would be what the doctors want to see
– pray they will be confident that Savannah will not need an initial open heart surgery and we can wait for her full repair to have any open heart surgery
– Pray that her anatomy would be EXTREMELY favorable for her heart repair – better than we could ever imagine – and that God would provide the doctors confidence without even a shadow of a doubt that she can have a full successful four-chamber repair.
– Pray for Ryan and me….I am scared and this is hard. I am frightened for my little girl, and she has no idea what is coming. I feel guilty as her mommy for handing her over for something like this, even though it’s what our situation mandates. Please pray we’d be held in the Lord’s hand as we walk through this first big step of Savannah’s heart journey.
– Please NEVER stop praying for Savannah’s healing. She so desperately needs a miracle from the Lord and the healing touch of Jesus.