Hallelujah!

God is SO good and SO faithful. We had a true miracle today. Last night, the surgeon came in to talk to us about the procedure today. He thought that after looking at the latest echocardiogram that Luke would actually need a more complicated and risky surgery, called the Norwood, instead of the D.K.S. we originally thought he would have. They are very similar, but the Norwood just is a bit more difficult to recover from. Well, Luke went in to surgery about 7:30 this morning and they give you a pager for updates. At around 10:30, we got a page that Dr. Cohen wanted to talk to us. That was an incredibly scary walk downstairs! We had no idea what he needed to talk to us about. It's so incredible ... once Dr. Cohen actually was able to see Luke's heart, he didn't think Luke needed the Norwood or the DKS, but a much simpler procedure called the pulmonary artery band. Basically, he put a gortex band around Luke's pulmonary artery, to restrict the blood flow to Luke's lungs. He said he'd be done within an hour, and Luke would now only need to be on the heart-lung bypass machine for 5 minutes. Plus the recovery time is much shorter. He thought we'd be home within a few days to a week. We are praising the Lord. There were about 8 of us last night praying in Luke's room, around his hospital crib, for a miracle and God answered.

Luke will still need his other surgeries, but this is such a good good thing. I am so thankful today for everyone who has been praying for us and loving us through this. I will keep you posted on any Luke updates. He is so amazing. Here is Luke in a nutshell: Almost as soon as they got him to the I.C.U. post-surgery, he started fighting his way out of anesthesia. They actually had to up his medication so he wouldn't wiggle so much! He is a true fighter with a strong will that we absolutely love!

Thank you again everyone. Please continue to pray for his quick recovery. They are thinking they'll be able to take the chest tube and breathing tube out tomorrow. He's already breathing again on his own, but they are regulating his breath with the breathing tube. His incision also looks really good. He will never have a boring show-and-tell, that's for sure!