Surprise! It's a ...

We had a visit with Tucker's cardiologist, Dr. Thomas, today. As a heart parent, this is a very nerve-racking experience, especially when it has been 6 months since the last checkup. The good news is that Tucker's heart looked great and we are still on track to have his last surgery in Summer 2013. You can read more about Tucker's checkup on his site: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/tuckerhamilton

The other bit of news we have is that, while we were at the cardiologist, we were given the opportunity to get a look at the new baby's heart. We were Dr. Thomas' last patient before lunch, so he had some extra time and asked us if we wanted to check on the baby's heart. Of course, we didn't hesitate or waste this opportunity, even though we have our next Perinatologist appointment next week and were scheduled for a fetal ultrasound then too.

Dr. Thomas took special care to look at each ventricle and all of the major vessels of the heart that were visible. He told us that he could only see about 60% of the things he needed to look at, but that all of those looked good. Specifically, the baby appears to have 2 normal sized ventricles and the aorta looked good too. This is such a relief because those are the two main parts of Tucker's defect, HLHS. He will look at the heart again next week more thoroughly and then we will go back for a final check sometime before 25 weeks, which we are currently at about 17 weeks.

I can't tell you how excited and blessed we are to have this news. We expected to check for these things next week, but we were beginning to get nervous about it. The one thing that was holding us back from being completely ecstatic about this baby was the fear of a repeat experience. It was actually quite emotional for us...Dena cried! We know that we can't be 100% sure of everything for a few more weeks, but we do feel better!

Finally, one of the other cardiologists asked us if we might want to check on the gender of the baby. Again, there was no hesitation...we certainly did! The baby was not in the best position to get a good look at the gender and the doctor is not an expert at determining gender, but she felt about 95% sure that the baby would be.

So for the news:

The bottom line for us is that we want a healthy baby. But, if we could pick which type of healthy baby, it would definitely be a girl. We have our little boy and we both felt like a girl would be a perfect fit. We already have a name picked out, we already have the guest room painted in a feminine color to become the nursery, and we think that Tucker will be a good big brother for a little sister!

This was a great day for our family! Tucker's heart looks amazing, the new baby's heart looks good, and we found out it would be a girl. We are blessed beyond measure! If we don't get anything at all for Christmas, this will be enough! Honestly, this news is the best present that we could have asked for, special thanks to Dr. Thomas for making this happen!

Thanks for stopping by and supporting our family! We hope that everyone has a great holiday and has an opportunity to love on your family. Remember that the reason we celebrate Christmas is because our God sent his only son to us, to die for our sins. It isn't about presents, food, or prosperity, it's about a tough situation that ended up saving our souls!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!!!

~Trent

A Piece of our Little Heart

You may not know this, but we LOVE Sanctus Real. When we found out that their lead singer, Matt, was going to have a son with HLHS, we went to their concert to meet him. We actually had never heard their music before, but we instantly fell in love with it. Even if you take away my friendship with Matt, I would still listen to their music. I have yet to find a Sanctus Real song that I didn't like.

All that being said, we listen to Sanctus Real fairly often. In fact, that is pretty much all I listen to in my truck because of Tucker. Every morning when we go to school and every afternoon when we go home, the first thing Tucker says upon entering my truck is, "Daddy...Tucker...listen...Matt...peese!" This is Tuckerese for "Daddy can we listen to Sanctus Real please?"

With all of that time spent listening to Sanctus Real, you can imagine that we know the songs well. We know them so well, that Tucker knows most of the words to the songs on their cd "Pieces of a Real Heart". He even knows the music without the words, he can recognize most Sanctus Real songs within 2-3 seconds of their start. Often times, if the music is low enough, we can catch him singing along in his sweet voice.

A few weeks ago, we were sitting around listening to music and we were actually able to catch him singing with the video camera on our phone. I have included the videos for your viewing pleasure!

Tucker isn't the only one who enjoys Sanctus Real. Since we met Matt, we have been to 6 of their concerts and have enjoyed them all. We will going to our 7th this weekend. Sanctus Real is wrapping up their tour with Casting Crowns and The Afters, so Dena and I are driving to Temple, Texas to see them. We are especially excited about this concert because Matt will be performing a song that he wrote for his son, Bowen, called "All of Me". We have seen him perform it before, but this will be the first time that we will see him share Bowen's story with a special slide-show going, and this will be a much larger crowd than usual. Here is Matt singing "All of Me" at the last concert that we went to, I know you will enjoy this:

In addition to the concert, Dena and I are taking the rest of the weekend to spend some time together. We will be going down to San Antonio after the concert to enjoy the River Walk. We are excited for a weekend away and are happy that we can leave Tucker to have some fun with Granny & Pops!

Thanks for visiting us and we hope that everyone has a great weekend!

~Trent

Everything is Cooking

We hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

Our week started out with a nerve wracking visit with the Perinatologist. For those that don't know, a perinatologist is a doctor who uses ultrasound to look at a fetus closely and take measurements to ensure that everything is going well with the pregnancy. We were more anxious than normal because of Tucker and because we saw a perinatologist twice with Tucker and she didn't catch his defect, even though she should have seen it.

Because of our previous experiences, we were not really sure what to think and very skeptical of any news that we received during our visit. The main difference for us was that this doctor came to us highly recommended by Dena's new ObGyn and by Dr. Thomas, Tucker's cardiologist. We thought that the doctor would be looking at the entire baby, but because of how early it is in the pregnancy, he could really only check for signs of Down's Syndrome. The good news is that there were no signs that the baby would have Down's Syndrome, they will confirm this with a blood test, results should be coming tomorrow. The "bad" news is that, while he did humor us and look at the heart, it was too early to see anything. We will have to wait until our next visit on January 2nd to look at the heart. Dr. Thomas should be at the next visit too, just to get a second set of eyes on the heart. We should also find out the gender of the baby on the 2nd too, so it will be a VERY big day!

The rest of the week was great! We spent a lot of time with my family and got to relax some. We also took Tucker to his first movie in a theater. We went to see "The Muppets" and Tucker had a pretty big time. He got his own popcorn, drink, and candy and got to sit in his own chair. He did okay, but got a little bored about 3/4 of the way through the movie. He love the songs and danced and clapped during the big finale!

Tucker at his first movie, The Muppets

Too much fun at the movies!

The other big thing on the horizon, besides the holidays, is that I'm about to start a new venture in life. As most of youI know, we are very involved in the CHD world as a result of our experiences with Tucker. For several months I have been working with Matt Hammitt, Bowen's dad, on the new Whole Hearts Foundation. I have been answering emails from new CHD parents, old CHD parents, families, friends, etc. I have also been in charge of the Whole Hearts facebook page. Whole Hearts will be teaming up with a new social network for CHD families, called Heartwaves.org. I have been asked to be a dad blogger for this new website. I am very excited about this opportunity. I hope that my experiences can help other dads and CHD families that are just starting this journey. I'm a little nervous about having enough to say and I will definitely have to improve upon my writing skills, but it should be fun! I will post information about my blog once we are up and running sometime in January. Right now, I've got to come up with a topic for my first blog entry, I feel writer's block already starting to creep in...oh no!

Tucker helping with the tree!

 I do have some more to say this week. Look for a post about our favorite group, Sanctus Real, and Tucker's love for their music!

As always, thanks for visiting and be sure to come back soon!

~Trent