Still Holding Steady

Many of you know about our son Kendall. But some of you may not. For those who don't, here is a brief summary: Kendall was born with a congenital heart defect called Shone's Complex or Shone's Syndrome (we've heard it both ways) which is basically two or more problems with the left side of his heart. In his case he had a coarctation of the aorta, mitral valve stenosis, and a thickening of his left ventricle. We discovered the problem at his two month well check and our lives changed dramatically that day. He was rushed to the hospital where they gave him medication to lower his blood pressure (he was near stroke level) for a couple of days before they took him to surgery to fix his coarctation (his aorta was narrowed significantly enough that blood was barely pumping into his lower extremities). He recovered from that very well and we spent the next couple of years just monitoring his condition with pediatric cardiologists. Then shortly after he turned three, Kendall began having breath holding episodes that would cause him to stop breathing and lose consciousness. At first his primary care doctor told us that she thought it was normal because she had several other patients who did the same thing. But when the episodes became more frequent and were not associated to crying (he passed out one day when we were walking rapidly from one building to another), we knew something was up. Sure enough, when we saw the cardiologist, he agreed that the mitral valve had worsened and was the cause of the blackouts. They first tried a heart catheterization and did a balloon procedure to see if that would make any difference. It didn't. He continued to get worse and worse and soon it was impossible for him to even climb our stairs on his own without getting so breathless that he would pass out. So when Kendall was 3 years and 9 months old he had open heart surgery to repair the mitral valve. The whole procedure was absolutely miraculous. He came out of it with his own valve intact rather than the artificial valve they had told us to expect. The doctor himself was amazed at how well it went and kept looking at his hands like he couldn't believe they had performed that procedure. Kendall spent only four days in the hospital and then rebounded in major way. For the next year or so he ran everywhere he went for the sheer joy of it. He has played soccer since he was four years old and loves any sort of thing that requires activity. The doctors always caution us that it is likely that he will have to have the valve replaced at some point and the problem with his ventricle remains as well. For now he takes a blood pressure medication that has the side effect of helping hearts to relax. The idea with that being that if there isn't so much pressure put on that ventricle, it won't harden any more and may in time actually have some tissue regeneration. We hope and pray that is the case since there is no repair for a ventricle other than a heart transplant. We are just thankful everyday for amazing medical science and for the power of prayer.

So anyway, Kendall just had his annual exam with his cardiologist and once again the report was fabulous. He had an echocardiogram that showed that everything had remained the same with both of the repairs he's had done. It has been almost six years since that last surgery and we feel so blessed that he is holding steady year after year.

If you get a chance, click on the Living For Eden link on my sidebar to visit the blog of Paul Cardall. He is a husband and father and a very talented musician with CHD who is currently waiting for a heart transplant. He has just made a video for YouTube featuring a whole bunch of CHD kids to get the word out about how common congenital heart defects are. It is set to some of his beautiful music, so that's a bonus as well. Take a look!

Kentucky (Round 2)

As I mentioned in my last post, this trip we left half of the family behind and I only had Taylor and Kaya with me. I definitely wanted to bring Taylor so that he could have the chance to see his great grandpa again plus I figured he'd be a great help with Kaya. Here we are with Granddaddy once again at Joe's visitation. He had gone a bit downhill in only the couple of weeks since we'd last seen him. He ended up leaving the visitation partway through because he was exhausted. He was back the next morning for the funeral though and insisted afterward that he was taking us to dinner even though it was only 10:30 in the morning.

We went to a steakhouse and wound up being hungrier than we thought we were. Grandaddy was done with having his picture taken and refused to look at the camera. (Apparently Ashley was done too!) In honor of my birthday Mom made sure that the waitstaff all sang to me and I was treated to a giant piece of cheesecake which we all shared.

Looks like another big tip was due! This place gave kids under 3 a free kid's meal complete with a gooey chocolate cookie.

On Saturday, we decided to take a break from all of the exhausting things associated with the death of a loved one and just do something fun. We decided to visit the Lost River Cave in Bowling Green. I had seen signs for it on the way down and asked my mom if she had ever been there. She hadn't so we decided to check it out.

We bought our tickets but had some time before our tour was scheduled so we spent some time browsing and buying souvenirs in the gift shop. Taylor was so excited when he found a barrel of geodes that are the kind you can have cut open after you buy one. He debated for a looonnnggg time before he finally decided on one. It ended up being a really beautiful choice. Mom and Susannah got some great ones too.

Finally we headed down the trail to the gathering site for the cave tour.

We crossed a really big footbrige that suspended over a trail below. Once we met up with our tour guide it was another hike to the actual cave. We stopped at a couple of spots on the way to hear some interesting facts about the area. For example Native Americans used the cave for shelter for thousands of years and there are some remaining hieroglyphics to document their existence. Many years later European settlers built a water-powered mill inside the entrance to the cave and this was used off and on for a very long time afterward. In the 1860's both Confederate and Union troops used the cave (not at the same time, of course) as a temporary shelter. Also it is rumored that Jesse James and his gang used the cave as a hideout and that they may have hidden a stash of goods somewhere in the cave which has yet to be recovered. Then in the 1930's a man had the brilliant idea of opening a night club at the cave entrance. It was the perfect location because it had natural air conditioning! It was very popular for a couple of decades. In fact we found an old picture (probably 1940's era) of my grandma standing at the foot of the stairs leading down to the night club! Unfortunately the club closed down in the early 60's for two reasons. One: air conditioning had become common in most buildings so it wasn't that big a deal anymore. And two: the owner refused to play the popular music of the day and preferred to stick with Jazz and Big Band music over Elvis. After that, the place eventually became a dumping ground. People would drive their stuff up to the edge and dump it in the river leading into the cave. It wasn't until the 1990's that someone decided to clean things up and open the cave as a tourist attraction. They said they pulled washers and dryers and even a car out of the water in the clean-up effort. It took a few years and the place has been open ever since.

Here we have the lovely Ashley posing at one of the Blue Holes along the trail. This is water from the river that has pooled up to the surface.

And here is the lone shot my camera took that even remotely shows anything from the interior of the cave. It was very interesting though. The tour is all done by boat. Kaya did not care for that at all because she had to wear a very restraining life vest. Then on top of that, to get back into the cave, we had to pass through a very low opening in which everyone in the boat had to lean over so far that our heads were in our laps. It was a bit freaky considering I'm a teeny bit claustrophobic. But once past that, the cave opened right up into a huge high-ceilinged room. The guide pointed our various interesting things and elaborated on some of the stories they had shared previously. The river actually went back for over seven miles into the cave, but we were only allowed to see the one section probably for our own safety.

Afterward, we went to check out the old night club. It's all still there with the bar and stage and everything. I guess they actually do proms and wedding receptions there now!

Kind of a strange sight to see a giant chandelier at a cave entrance!

This is another of the Blue Holes. They weren't looking too blue that day because the skies were so overcast. They told us that in the sunshine the water looks amazingly blue.

We continued back on the trail to see the butterfly house before we ended our experience. That was actually pretty fun.

They had several species of butterflies but mostly Monarch's were the ones we saw.

Everytime a butterfly would fly past, Kaya would do her surprised face. So cute!

She actually got to hold one but tried to eat the poor thing.

Budding scientist Taylor was in his element for the whole experience.

After that we went out to eat at a buffet for lunch. I took a funny picture that I thought I had uploaded on here but I guess I missed it. Oh well. Susannah got one too so I'll let her load it on her blog. It gave us a chuckle anyway. Over the dessert bar was a sign that read: "Children 10 and under must be accompanied by an adult to all bars." Of course it was referring to the food bars in the restaurant but it just sort of struck us all as funny if it was read out of context.

That night we went and visited Granddaddy in the nursing home and watched a couple of episodes of Andy Griffith with him before heading back and going to bed.

Sunday we went to church. First we went to a branch in Russelville for sacrament meeting. It was a tiny little group but a really fantastic service. Afterward we went to the Baptist service at the church that my granparents attended. That was actually pretty fun. Music is a huge deal! It was so much fun singing those hymns because EVERYONE sang whether they had talent or not and I found myself wishing that members of the LDS church would do that. I've been in a few wards where the members actually sing, but most places I've been to the members sort of hide behind their hymnals and whisper along while those who are talented and a few brave not- so-talented people sing.

Anyway, we all took a nice afternoon nap after that and then went for another visit to the nursing home. Andy Griffith was on again and Taylor said afterward: "I probably wouldn't turn that show on myself but if it was already on, it's a pretty good show." It was fun watching him laugh at some of those old episodes.

Monday we packed up and headed back. We made the trip in only 7 1/2 hours so that was fantastic. I don't think Kaya would have been able to take much more! It is so good to be back again and we are so glad that my mom will be coming back tomorrow. Of course she'll have to make frequent trips down again to see my grandpa but even a couple of weeks of normalcy will be really nice for all of us.

Memories of Joe

At about the same time as I was clicking the button to publish my last post in which I reported that my uncle Joe was doing much better and was expected to recover, he was in fact having a massive set back. Without warning his heart just stopped. They were able to revive him with CPR but he had been a long time without oxygen and was unresponsive. Tests showed only minimal brain activity. They decided to give him 72 hours to see if he showed any improvement, but he never did. So the heartbreaking decision was made by my mom to turn off his machines and let him go. I cannot imagine how awful that must have been for her and I hope I never have to make a choice like that.

So we found ourselves with another funeral to attend back in Kentucky. This time Kalen stayed behind with Kendall, Lynnsey, and Spencer and Taylor, Kaya and I rode with Timothy in his car. (Kaya is never going to trust us again when it comes to putting her in her car seat!)

The funeral was held on July 17th (my birthday, by the way). (The visitation was the night before which was nice not to have the long day that we had at my grandma's funeral). The service was held right at the gravesite which was actually quite nice I thought and probably the way Joe would have wanted it. We laughed a little bit as we drove into the cemetary and the skies opened up and POURED rain. It was the first funeral I'd ever been to that it rained but we joked that it was Joe's idea because it always rains at funerals in the movies and he was a major movie guy. Luckily, the rain stopped almost as quickly as it started so the actual service was rain-free. We enjoyed a hymn sung by a really talented friend of their family and then the pastor shared some scriptures and reminisced about Joe and his life. I really enjoyed his remarks. He talked about how what you saw with Joe was what you got. He never tried to pretend to be anyone different. He was always friendly to everyone and was quite a fixture around town. He said he used to make his rounds nearly everyday around the town businesses. He'd pop his head in and make his prescence known. His favorite place was the grocery store where he actually worked for a lot of years and would often go to help them out with anything they needed. After the pastor's remarks, he concluded with a prayer. It was a nice service, I thought.

My own memories of Joe are similar to what others said about him. As kids we always loved to see him when we visited. He always had little treats for us but never for all of us at once. He would pull one or two of us aside and give us something that would be our little secret and I remember feeling so special to be singled out. I remember he gave Alison and I our first Barbie dolls when we were really young. My parents were so not happy about that! But we loved those dolls and played with them for years--more than any of our other Barbie's which came later.

As we got older the big treat was a trip to see a show at least once everytime we visited. But that was only a treat for the 12 and older group. I remember going to see The Man From Snowy River 2 the first time he took us to the movies.

I remember Joe laughing a lot. I loved how he would rub his hands together excitedly like he had a big secret he was bursting to tell. And I always thought it was funny how he'd call us "Hot Rod" as kids and my mom and dad were "Ol' Woman" and "Ol' Man".

He didn't have a super easy life. He was born with a cleft lip and palate at a time where surgery could only do so much to repair them. At times his speech could be really difficult to understand And in those days so many things were misunderstood and so many people were excluded from a normal education for things that really had nothing to do with their intelligence. I'm not sure what school was like for him but I know he never attended college. He never married and always lived with my grandparents. But he was one of the most optimistic and truly happy people I've had the pleasure of knowing.

I loved what the people at the town grocery store did in honor of him and it pretty much sums up how I feel too. On their marquis on the store front they wrote: That's for sure.

Kentucky

Just a few weeks after the passing of my sister Kayleigh, we learned the news that my Grandaddy (my mom's father) had untreatable cancer that seemed to be spreading rapidly through his body. They gave him about three months to live and put him in hospice care in a nursing home. My mom has been gone from Michigan more than she's been here in the last few months as she has been helping my grandma to deal with all those issues. Well, the three month time frame they gave us came and went well over a month ago, so when my mom called me a couple of weeks ago with bad news I absolutely expected that she was going to tell me that Grandaddy's condition had worsened or that he had even died. But no. It was terrible news about my Grandma and my Uncle Joe. They had been in a car accident and both were flown to Nashville and were in critical condition. Initially they were most worried about my uncle's condition since his injuries were more serious, but soon my grandmother started having issues with her blood pressure and seizures (she has epilepsy) and so they weren't sure if she would pull through after all. Finally she seemed to make some improvement and they had actually moved her to a different room. Mom and my sister Susannah were able to spend a good day visiting with her. But shortly after they gave her an epidural to help with the awful pain she was in, Grandma's blood pressure dropped really low and they couldn't get it back up again. They think that what happened was that once her pain was gone, she didn't have that adreniline helping to pump her heart so that when she actually was able to relax, so did everything else. Mom and Susannah were asked to come in to be with her and they held her hands and talked to her as she slipped from this life.

Grandma's name was Mildred Jean King Bloodworth and she was the sweetest lady you can imagine. She was so tiny (picture under 5 feet and about 90 pounds) that as kids Alison and I always felt enormous next to her. She was always calm and happy and I never, ever heard her raise her voice in anger in all the time I knew her. She and Grandaddy were so cute together. I loved when we would visit and she'd actually flirt with him a little bit and he would get all embarassed and huffy at her but you could also tell that he was pleased too and I always wondered what they were like when their house wasn't crawling with family. Grandma was devoted to her Baptist church and especially loved her Sunday School class. When we went through some of her things I realized that the only books she had in the house were either Bibles or devotional type books. I think she was a deeply spiritual person and I know in my last phone conversation with her she told me how much she loved it that Spencer was praying for Grandaddy every day.

We always loved going to visit them every year. One of my clearest memories is of Grandma giving me a notepad when I was about 6 or 7 years old so that I could draw pictures and when I was getting frustrated at not being able to draw a house the way I wanted to, she sat down with me and showed me how to draw a house so that it looked almost 3 dimensional. I was so excited to show off that new skill to my friends back home who were still drawing a square with a triangle on the top for their houses! I also loved when she would walk "uptown" to the store with us and we always got to put a quarter in the machine that housed a chicken with a bunch of toy-filled plastic eggs. When we put our quarter in, the chicken would cluck and turn in cirles and then "lay" and egg for us. When I got older, Grandma would always find things in her closet that she wanted to give me. I remember taking some of her dresses and shoes to be nice but of course, there is a world of style difference between a 60 year old grandma and her 15 year old granddaughter. I do remember a pair of gray shoes she gave me once that I adored though and I wore them completely out. I didn't know it until just recently but Grandma used to work at a shoe store and so she always had the latest styles in shoes. When we went through her closet we found boxes and boxes of those same shoes! And of course now that I found some that are back in style, my big old foot refused to squeeze into any of them.

I looked through our pictures to see if I could find a picture of Grandma to share but I didn't have a single one of just her. She and Grandaddy were always together, so naturally all their photos are of them together. They are such a sweet couple and I am thankful that they won't be separated for very long. We were all able to travel down to Kentucky for the funeral. Taylor didn't come since he was at scout camp and we had already paid the fees for that so there wasn't anything that was going to keep him from that camp! It takes about 8 hours to drive to Kentucky and with the other four kids and Timothy in our crowded car, it seemed like the longest drive ever! But the kids actually handled it quite well. (Timothy too). Kaya gets mad now everytime we put her in the car seat though!

We arrived Sunday night in time to go to the church of one of my mom's friends where they were doing fireworks. We were so close to them that every time one went off, I felt the urge to dive to the ground and cover my head. The kids loved it though and Spencer was proud of his little collection of debris that he caught.

Monday was the day of the visitation and the funeral. LONG DAY. We had to be at the funeral home at 9:30 a.m. and the funeral wasn't until 2:00 p.m. Luckily they had a lounge with a TV in it where I was able to deposit the kids for most of the time. They would have been impossible if they'd had to be in the chapel for that entire time.

Grandaddy was able to come from the nursing home. I think it was harder for me to see him than it was actually being at my Grandma's funeral. This is a man who was always a doer. He was always working or busy and on the go. So now to see him so frail and in a wheel chair was really hard. Even harder was watching him with Grandma. Every once in awhile, he'd take a break from visiting with friends and wheel himself over to her casket. I had to swallow the giant lump in my throat every time he did that.

The service was nice. They had the two pastors of her church speak. I've been to non-LDS funerals before that have been so depressing and sad, so I was a little worried about this one. But it was very much a celebration of a remarkable life and was very uplifting and hopeful, so that was very good. Then as soon as the service ended, Grandaddy took off up to the casket again for one final goodbye and I and many others fell to pieces right about then. So heartbreaking.

Then we drove back to Adairville to the cemetary. One pastor shared a scripture and then Kalen dedicated the grave in a beautiful prayer.

Some of the women from the Baptist church put together a luncheon at the church for us with more food than we could possibly eat. It was wonderful and so sweet of them to do.

Grandaddy was spent after that and so they finally took him back to the nursing home where he got right into bed and slept. Even under such sad circumstances, I am so glad we were able to see him. And have him see some of his great grandkids again.


Here we all are at the funeral. I was glad that Jonathan, Nathan, and Samuel made the trip out too.

A couple of years ago, they came up for a visit and Spencer immediately connected with Grandaddy. I've actually never seen anything quite like it. I worried that this time since Spencer is older and Grandaddy is so much frailer that Spencer would be too shy. But he went right to him and he was actually the one that wanted to sit on Grandaddy's lap for a picture.


On Tuesday, I went with Mom, Timothy, and Susannah over to Nashville to see Joe. He was still in pretty bad shape and still needing the respirator to help his breathing. He was still pretty sedated but he did wake up for a minute while I was there. I don't think he knew me at first but I could tell after a few seconds that he got it. Of course he couldn't talk with the tube in his throat. The doctors say that his internal injuries are healing nicely now but they were most worried about this pnueumonia that he has. Today though, I found out from my mom that he's even doing better with that and that if it continues to respond, they'll move him over to a rehabilitation center that's in the same building where Grandaddy is on Monday. He's able to talk now too, so my mom said that was really nice.

On Tuesday afternoon we enjoyed taking the kids down to the little playground down the street from the house where we used to play every chance we got as kids. As simple as it is, I think our kids loved it just as much as we used to.

We also went for a drive before dinner that night out to an old cemetary with a replica of an old meeting house where apparently there was a pretty big religous revival back in the early 1800's. It was pretty fascinating actually. I guess up until then, the area was home to some pretty big criminals including thieves and murderers. After that, religion caught on and has stuck in a big way.

Some of these tombstones were hundreds of years old--we're talking 1700's.

Spencer recognized his name on one of the stones.

The original building was destroyed years ago and then was rebuilt in the 1950's. Then that one was destroyed by fire so this one was rebuilt in the 1990's. It was still pretty interesting though.

I'm glad our chairs at church are more comfy than these!

We thought Nathan looked the part of the old-time preacher with his long hair and beard.

After our visit to the cemetary, Grandaddy wanted us to come over so he could take us out to dinner. We drove him over to Shoney's for steak night. It was a nice dinner and really nice to spend one last evening with Grandaddy.

Here is the reason that we feel compelled to tip extra everytime we eat out. What a mess!

We had a pretty yummy dinner. Incidentally it was Ashley's birthday and mine and Kalen's anniversary so we were treated to a really decadent dessert. It wasn't quite the way Kalen and I had planned to celebrate 15 years together (we were actually thinking something big like Niagra Falls), but that's okay. We still had a nice celebration. (I love you Kalen! Thanks for an amazing decade and a half.)

Once again, I am just so glad that Kaya and Grandaddy were able to meet. I know Grandma would have loved her and I wish the visit had been under different circumstances.

After dropping Grandaddy back at the nursing home and bidding him farewell, we went back to Adairville. We had a late but fun night playing Phase 10 before hitting the sack at about 1:30 in the morning. We got up a few hours later and had a the traditional breakfast that Grandaddy used to make for us every morning when we visited: sausage, bacon, eggs and flaky layered biscuits with orange juice. YUM! I could feel my arteries clogging every time I swallowed. We spent the morning going through more of Grandma's things and taking a few mementoes. (Lynnsey got a jewelry box full of some great costume jewelry and she made sure to split her treasure into a second box for her cousins Isabel and Cecily). Then all to soon it was time to pack up and head back home. Jonathan and crew followed us up so that he could do some things on his house in his remaining days off. Mom, Susannah and Ashley all stayed behind to continue getting things in order on that end and making sure that Joe gets situated comfortably. This sure wasn't the way I had planned my summer but it did end up being a nice trip. I'm glad we were able to go.