Pictures 12/30

For update on "Putman5", see below. Here are some fun pictures (I've not posted pictures in a while, and Jeremy has gotten some great pictures of our kids this month!)

Katie and Connor both love to "pat" and "tickle" and "poke" (belly button) baby. They are so sweet!

Update 12/30

Happy New Year!

We met with both the pediatric surgeon and our perinatologist this week. We now have more questions than answers (which is probably good since the answers we thought we had were not necessarily accurate). Baby will need surgery after birth... sometime. (We are still praising the Lord that baby will, Lord willing, be fine until birth - hooray!). Surgery will be depending on both baby's breathing ability and weight-gaining ability. There are about 4 or 5 "typical" scenarios that we could fall under. Each would require surgery after a different amount of time (hours, days, weeks or months). Part of us wants to just "get it done", but the Drs. would prefer that baby make it to 4 or 5 months and then do surgery. We are thankful that it is not a decision that we make, but that we can trust the Lord to do what is good "for we who are called according to His purpose." and that He will give us sufficient grace for whatever situation that is. We are also resting on His ability to do "above and beyond all that we ask or imagine.

One other piece of truth has helped me put this all in perspective. We have been going to the specialist since 22 weeks (23 weeks baby developed hydrops, drained at 24 wks, shunt at 25). We are now at 30 week. That's only 8 weeks. We have 10 left. A LOT can change in that amount of time. I need to remember that. The last 3 weeks the mass has stayed about the same, it has not been shrinking which we were hoping for starting at 28 weeks.

Thanks for your prayers and support.

In other news, we have had a wonderful Christmas. Meg's brother and aunt have been in town and Connor & Katie are very fun ages. Excited to work on establishing more traditions for next year to remind us to focus on the Lord instead of all the "other".

Putman Update 12/17

Hello friends,

Our littlest baby is still without hydrops and swelling - hooray! Statistically, it looks like we're stable until birth, we'll continue being monitored weekly until then. Just 2 things we are thankful for:

*That this is our 3rd baby. We are getting quite spoiled with the luxury of weekly ultrasounds, and we will have a growth check (yes, we will know the weight of baby) next week - that is done monthly. I think a "normal" pregnancy after this one )

would be tough on us ("what's going on in there?")

*The shunt is still in place. The part of the shunt that is outside of baby is wrapped around his/her arm. The doctor thinks that, if anything, it can cause cosmetic damage. Thankful we can continue to monitor to make sure blood supply is still good in that arm.

In other news, Connor is officially a 3 year old (Dec. 14). Hard to believe he's that old. Today we are enjoying a gorgeous, clear, sunny day! This morning Connor says "Look, Mommy! Sunshine! Thank you, God." (He hears me point out every ray of sunshine). Despite my best efforts to instill a love for sunshine in my children with comments such as those he has his own opinions. In the car about an hour later, he said "Mommy loves sunshine. Connor and Katie don't like sunshine. It's too shiny. People don't like sunshine. Cars like sunshine." Oh bother!

As we near the end of the year, I am tracking our Drs. appointments and mileage, etc, and we have had 15 visits to the specialist and/or hospital, and 1419 miles. Impressive, right? I also had to chuckle as it looks like we will just reachy our "out of pocket maximum" (for this calendar year) on our insurance almost exactly at Dec 31. I love that as I realize these things, the Holy Spirit immediately follows with the truth of "God knew that and will provide. He is in control of both the cells in baby's body and all the financial arrangements in the world," and I can respond by laughing.

Merry Christmas, all! We have one more appointment before Christmas and hopefully it will be "no news". The week after, we are meeting with surgeons at Children's.

Meg

Putman 5 Update 12/8

Three exciting words:

NO MORE HYDROPS!

At today's appointment, baby looked normal (well, except for the mass that's still in the chest). No fluid in abdomen, no swelling in skin or skull. We are SO thrilled and thankful. Our risk level for the hydrops re-developing (based on mass size and head circumference) is in the lower category. Woo-hoo. This means that we can start thinking about delivery, etc (first week of March, Lord willing) and going in weekly.

I continue to be incredibly thankful for the quality of care that I am receiving. Absolutely exceptional. I am also thankful for the Lord's timing... we may be able to get Christmas decorations up this year =)

Sending our love and gratitude for your prayers and support,

Meg

Saturday 12/4 Putman5 Update

We had another ultrasound/perinatologist appointment yesterday (Friday) and everything looks as good or better than it has. Thank the Lord! We are so amazed and thankful for several things:

1) That the fluid in the stomach - hydrops - is decreasing (hooray!)

2) The mass is approx. the same

3) We only have to go in weekly (unless something changes) here on out!!

4) Our children are growing more affectionate with baby (they kiss, tickle, and pat baby voluntarily)

His mercy is new every morning, and we are especially feeling the mercy of relief right now. Moving forward, the things we are praying for are:

1) Continued reduction/elimination of the hydrops (which indicates strain on heart)

2) For the mass to begin to decrease

3) God's will in delivery (c-section vs. VBAC) - this is not affected by baby's condition, but Meg's.

4) God's will post-delivery with baby's surgery and recovery.

Thank you for your continued support and prayers.

Love,

Jeremy, Meg, Connor, Katie and Putman5 (or "baby")

11/30 Putman5 Update

Since the shunt placement last Tuesday, it seems that baby has "stabilized". That is in quotes because stable isn't exactly what we'd call an unborn baby with a large mass in its chest. However, it has not grown since Tues and that is great. As far as these things go, the "norm" is to grow fairly rapidly until 26 weeks and then start to shrink around 28 weeks (we are exactly 26 weeks today), and baby is still growing which helps to create a big more space for both the heart and the mass.

The swelling in the head is almost gone (hooray!) as well as the edema of the skin. The fluid in the tummy is about the same, the Dr. was a bit surprised (at our appointment yesterday) that it hasn't gone down more.

Requests:

*That baby's mass would begin to shrink, and we will make it to term for surgery immediately after birth.

*That we would purposefully seek and find opportunities to proclaim God's greatness during our appointments.

Praise:

*Our appointments this week are only Mon/Fri (we haven't had only 2 in a week in the past month, woo hoo!)

*Our Dr. is hoping to see us early next week and then weekly (double woo hoo!)

*This Dr. agreed, a few weeks ago, to take me on as an O.B. patient as well. This is not at all typical (they try to avoid "stealing" patients), but I'm so thankful for God's provision in this area. Before and during this mass discovery I was not feeling particularly well cared for by my other O.B., but I didn't necessarily want to switch to an unknown O.B. for half a pregnancy.

Here is are "before" pictures. One is a cross section, you can see the heart labeled, and the other is "sagital" (lengthwise) showing how long the mass is. The black "holes" inside the mass are the cysts that the shunt is emptying.



Here are "after" pictures (from Thursday morning). Same shots, but with the cysts (black holes) gone, it's a lot harder for us non-professionals (and sometimes the professional) to see the mass. So our Dr. put the measurements on it for us, so those show you the outline.

Friday 11/26 Putman5 Update

Jeremy sent out a few status updates via Facebook on Tuesday, so here I will try to recap Putman5 events this week from Tuesday to today. As for the rest of us, we had a quiet Thanksgiving. Someone from Mom & Dad's church provided the Thanksgiving meal big stress reliever for my Mom and let me stay off my feet. I love how the Lord provides for ALL our needs (and many of our wants!).

We were at the hospital for a total of 8 hours on Tuesday. We had a lot of snow on Monday and roads were bad Monday evening, but The Lord provided clear traffic and we got there safely (we didn't need the chains we had put on the night before). The procedure was at 8:40. The Doctor's went into baby via a thick needle (after anesthetizing my skin and sedating baby first, thankfully!) and inserted the shunt (basically a one way suction tube) into the largest cyst inside baby's mass. On me it was on my front left tummy area. On baby it comes out just under baby's left shoulder blade, in the back. Baby was in a GREAT position for this as it enabled them easy access away from baby's heart. Everything in the procedure went as well as possible.

We were kept for monitoring and had a follow-up ultrasound at 3 p.m. By that time, almost ALL the fluid (black spots on the previous picture of baby) was GONE. There is one small cyst that is not drained because it is not "communicating" (in layman's - connected) to the big one that the shunt is in.

We had a follow up appointment yesterday morning, and the cysts are remaining drained, so the mass is quite a big smaller. We can see the right lung now (left is still quite squashed under the mass and will remain so), the heart is more toward the center of the body and looks huge to our eyes. The swelling in the head has gone down some, and the edema in the body also. The fluid in the abdomen looks about the same, and the Dr. said we would "expect" (as much as anything like this can follow any expected pattern) it to take a few weeks for baby to reabsorb all that fluid. We have also been able to see the stomach. The ultrasound tech surmised that the mass was blocking baby's ability to swallow. When baby cannot swallow, then the stomach is empty and is not visible on ultrasound. Hooray! Baby is swallowing now.

Thank you for your continued prayers. We are so thankful. Short of miraculous healing (which we know God can do) it looks like we'll remain monitored throughout pregnancy and baby will have surgery immediately after delivery to enable breathing and proper lung development. I am praying for 2x a week appointments (or less often) and for the hydrops to be resolving.

Hope you are enjoying a wonderful time of focusing on the Lord "and all His benefits"