This is Endurance

Let me briefly tell you about Endurance so you'll know his story...

Endurance Jonathan Holston was born on September 10th, 2010 with a congenital heart defect called Critical Aortic Stenosis /Aortic Atresia, causing his left ventricle to swell, leading to dialated cardiomyopathy, which basically the left ventricle was huge and not working.

On his second day of life Endurance was taken to Mary Bridge Children's Hosptial in Tacoma.  He had two surgical procedures called an atrial septostomy and a balloon aortic valvuloplasty.   Three days after the surgery, the head cardiologist advised Mike and I to either proceed with "comfort care," meaning let him die "peacefully," or to transport him up to Seattle Children's Hospital to investigate the option of heart transplant.


The day after our arrival to Seattle Children's, Endurance (a whopping six-days old!) had his second valvuloplasty.  It was another success that we praise God for!


A week later, realizing that the previous surgeries would not be enough, we were referred to the heart transplant team.  During this time, and praying for guidance, the Lord led Mike to several Godly men for advice.  Also, by the hand of God only, we listened to these very awesome, informative cds on the exact topic of brain death and heart transplants.  By the way, if you have not listened to this conference or have never heard of it, we highly recommend that you do!  You'll see how we've all been misinformed.  Mike also found a page online that reiterated the newly redefined term of brain death as Dr. Gill and Dr. Payne had described on the cds.  Mike and I made the very difficult decision to not proceed with a heart transplant for Endurance.  Onward ho!


We then moved forward with a hybrid palliation stage 1 operation when Endurance was 26 days old.  This procedure coincides with patients that have hypoplastic left heart syndrome, yet was the best option for Endurance.  It consists of three procedures: pulmonary banding, a stent placement in his PDA, and a more agressive atrial septostomy.  This surgery allows us multiple options, if God wills, when Endurance is 5 or 6 months old.


So here we are with Endurance, being 62 days old.  His days are up and down, good and bad.  We're still praying for his left ventricle to work.  We're praying that his right ventricle, which is getting weaker daily, to improve.  We're praying for God to sustain his life, if He wills...  

 

James 4:13-15  

¹³ Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; ¹⁴ whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. ¹⁵ Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.”