"It's Time."

Those were the first words out of Dr. Watts today during our meeting. He told us that it was time to move onto the next stage of "reworking the plumbing in his heart."

The reason? Because his oxygen levels are sitting between 70-75% and under 70%, according to Dr. Watts, is in the "danger zone." Our thoughts were "ok Doc, whatever you say, lets get this show on the road."

These folks are miracle workers with their hands and a scalpel.

The next surgery will involve the simultaneous removal of half of Cole's shunt while "redirecting" one of his other arteries so that it does the job that his shunt has been doing. Easy stuff, right? :-) The other half of the shunt will remain in Cole's heart, but will be closed off. The reason they only remove half, Dr. Watts said, is because it's more risky trying to remove the entire shunt because it's sewn in. Basically, the route Cole's heart is currently using to direct the flow of blood will have "access denied" and the existing artery that will be used will grow along with "Tubbs McGee." This artery will be routed to take blood to his lungs.

We sat and listened as we were told the risks - some "minor" and others "not so minor." We were also told to expect to see Cole's head swollen and eyes swollen after surgery. They will have Cole at an incline (feet down) to bring down this swelling but at the same time, if we were not warned, we would have been freaked out by the sight of Cole "E.T. Phone Home" Griffin. The good news is that there is a 97-98% success rate and we have one of the best pediatric heart surgery teams in the country! Dr. Watts did say that if something did happen that would qualify for that 2%, it would be something major. *GULP*

Think about this for a second: 97-98% sounds pretty good, right? We agree. However, if someone were to tell you that tomorrow when you get up, you had a 97% chance of surviving the day, would you leave your house?

The official date is July 7th, 2008. This is the day that Cole turns exactly 6 months old and it is also filled with some perfect numbers.....7/7/2008...lots of 7's there. Please remember this little Tubbs McGee on that day. Not so much us, we will be ok, but mainly that little "Blue Eyes."

Not really a whole lot more to mention here until the big day. However, if anyone has any specific questions, please post them and we will try to answer them as best we can. We are exhausted after another long day filled with info about our little fella so forgive us if we do not ramble on more tonight.

One more interesting thing...the cost of the "minor" catheterization that occured last week? Try $52,000. So one could either pay for that or buy a new Mercedes. Thank the Lord for insurance. You could say we met our maximum out of pocket fairly quickly. I could see Dr. Stern washing his hands in pre-op and then telling his nurse "Welp, there goes their deductible!"

God Bless and Good Night!

Matt and Laura