“An invisible red thread connects those destined to meet, regardless of time, place, or circumstances. The thread may stretch or tangle, but never break.” – Ancient Chinese Proverb

As I sit in Iris’ room at Doernbecher tonight, I am reminded of this proverb. An invisible red thread connected me to both of my daughters and them to each other. At the right time. At the right place. Life has presented challenges and tested every part of my core, but I honestly cannot imagine my life any other way. It is exactly how it was meant to be and, even on challenging days, I feel grateful.

So today’s news:

The balloon dilation went well. The complicated part is that the vessels coming off of Iris’ left pulmonary artery are severely hypoplastic and very close together. It makes ballooning them tricky because ballooning one might compress the other, making it difficult to get the wire in it to perform the balloon dilation. Dr. Armsby placed wires in two of the vessels before she ballooned them and was, therefore, able to balloon them both … but they’re still tiny and Iris will need future procedures. It’s the nature of her unique heart. Its imperfections are what makes it, and her, so strong and beautiful. At this point, Dr. Armsby plans to balloon the vessels once a year, and in 2-3 years they will be a sufficient size to have stents put in. The stents will be replaced every few years until Iris is fully grown. Nothing is certain, but this our plan as of today.

Here is a photo of Iris’ pulmonary arteries (the lines going up the left side of the photo are her sternal wires). You can see the line coming up from the bottom that the catheter followed to the larger opening. That opening is her main pulmonary artery, and the left and right pulmonary arteries branch off from it. The right pulmonary artery (shown left in the photo) is normal with great blood flow. It extends out and then branches off. The left pulmonary artery doesn’t extend out in the same way. Since it was wrapped around her trachea, part of it was removed … so those teeny tiny branches come off almost immediately, which is problematic:

So today was a good day in the sense that we have a better understanding of our path. There will be plenty of doctors’ appointments and more procedures in her future, but Iris’ health is 180 degrees from where it was a few months ago … which takes me back to the red thread.

A red thread connected me to my daughters … but it also connected Dr. Langley, Dr. Rutter, Dr. Armsby, and Dr. Milczuk to us. At the right time. At the right place.

Here is Iris sleeping peacefully tonight in her hospital bed. I truly have more blessings than I can count: