Maria and Elias

Maria (Elias’ first cousin once removed) came to see him:

Best picture of Elias to date!

Elias is really starting to smile and Kami has been very diligent in trying to capture those smiles. She took this picture this morning. He is definately a morning person!

Chunk (a.k.a. Elias)

Here are some of the latest pics of Elias. 3 weeks ago, he weighed in at 11 lbs. We can only imagine where he is at today

Health Scare

For those of you that didn’t know (word travels fast), we had a health scare this last week in our family. I’ve been working “4X10″ work weeks at State Farm, which means I work 4, 10 hour days and get an extra day off. I was given Mondays as my “virtual day.”

So, with the extra day off, Dad and I started working on the yard. We started about 8:00 in the morning and worked on tilling the dirt in the yard in preparation for seed. We quit shortly after lunch due to the heat (90+ degrees with high humidity). After Dad left, I worked for a little longer cleaning up tools, putting things away, etc… then went inside to shower and nap.

I slept for about 2 hours and woke up with terrible chest pains on the right side of my chest and my right arm. I’d been having pains like this for about 2 weeks and had seen my family doctor about it the previous week. He told me that since I had a workup done on my heart only 3 years ago and was given the thumbs up that heart conditions could not progress in such a short time. So, I was treated for stomach problems (ulcers and such).

The next day, August 14th, is Sydnee’s birthday so we were heading to Bloomington for a pre-birthday party at Kami’s parents house. I was in a lot of pain on the way down and told Kami that if it wasn’t gone by the time we got to her parents that I was going to the ER. At this point I was totally convinced that the pain was still resulting from the stomach problems and had Kami convinced as well. We got to Ruth and Larry’s house and the pain had not subsided, so off to the ER I went. Considering the “fact” that my pain was just from stomach problems, I convinced Kami to stay with the kids, especially because of Sydnee’s b-day. She did so reluctantly.

So, I drove to the ER, signed in and sat in the waiting room for about an hour, then laid in a bed for about an hour. During the second hour, blood was drawn and I was given some sort of shake that is designed to numb the mouth and throat for extreme acid reflux. Unfortunately, this did not fix the problem.

After about 2 hours of waiting in the ER, 5 people rushed into my curtain area with equipment and drugs and started jabbing me with IVs. The on-call cardiologist came in shortly after and told me I was having a heart attack. I was very shocked. I’m only 30! How could I be having a heart attack?? Well… after some reflection time, it makes sense. I’ve made some pretty poor choices in my life in regards to my health. Some of that was in the process of being rectified and the rest is being changed now and going forward.

The end result was that I had an artery that was 98% blocked and required an angioplasty and 2 stents to repair the blockage. I was admitted to the hospital Monday evening and was having the stents inserted Tuesday morning. I was released from the hospital Thursday mid-day and with the exception of some leg pain and wearing out easily, I feel great! I’m off work for at least 4 weeks and will only be going back part time after that so I can finish cardiac rehab. I start that process on the 28th of August and it will last 8 weeks.

We feel very fortunate and blessed that the results were what they were. Although this is a very serious event in my life, things could have been much worse given a longer delay in the ER or decision not to go at all.

For those interested, I will be posting my new Heart Healthy diet as well as my exercise routine as soon as I’m able. Obviously, I’ve had to completely change my eating habits, which definitely die hard :). I haven’t started the exercise due to doctor’s orders, but have been working on putting it together. I should be able to after my first few days of cardiac rehab. More later…

First smile captured on camera!!

After dancing the jig, making some really weird noises and in general, acting like an idiot in an attempt to get Elias to smile… Mommy looks at him and says “Hi…” in a cheerful voice. If that would have been mentioned in the manual, I could have saved some real embarrassment…