MY SON, JARED.

Here is my son, Jared. This was taken on his first day of Junior High! I can't believe how time flies by. I, actually I should say We, are so blessed to have this little miracle still around.

I had him at just 36 weeks gestation. It was a difficult labor and delivery, with it finally ending after 21 hours of labor. He was born with the cord wrapped around his neck, but with no other signs of obvious problems. Now I say obvious because what was really going on was not obvious. It was internal and was like a ticking time bomb.

It took the doctors around 2 months to finally give me an explanation to why my son was not eating much, why he would cry a lot, and why he looked like he was breathing too fast.

After an x ray and a observant doctor, He wanted to do more tests. He told us it looked like my son was born with "Dextrocardia" A term used to describe when someone was born with the heart on the opposite side of their chest. So it would be an understatement to say that we were in shock.

There was so many tests and many many stays in the hospital. After 3 surgeries and after too many months to count of hospital stays, and after 5 years, Jared was finally out of danger.

He had open heart surgery as his final operation to close a hole in his heart the size of a nickle. He was officially diagnosed with "Scimitar Syndrome"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scimitar_syndrome (is a link for more info)
He has only one segment of his right lung, but it has no gas exchange function. So basically he only has one lung, his left. He has moderate to severe asthma and emotional asthma. He has pulmonary hypertention, and the beginning stages of Cor Pulmonale.

But he is alive and doing fabulous. He hasn't had anymore pnuemonia battles, or hospital visits since his open heart surgery.

He is truly my little miracle and my special needs kid! He is my everything.

Oh did i mention  i was 19 years old when i had him and started going through these things! talk about a fast slap of reality to make you grow up!

ANGELA