Our girl's heart

We have been asked a lot of questions so I thought I would explain (copy and paste from a medical site) our baby girl's heart condition. We are not exactly sure what she has. The sonogram of her heart does not make complete sense, but we believe that she has a condition called Tetralogy of Fallot. We do not have a concrete diagnosis because the test used and results are poorly written. Our social worker explained that where she is located in China, the medical technology is poor, and they will not spend the money on a "orphan" to get further testing completed in a major city, such as Beijing. We will complete further tests at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh as soon as we get her home. So here is her condition...

Tetralogy of Fallot involves four heart defects:
A large ventricular septal defect (VSD)
Pulmonary (PULL-mon-ary) stenosis
Right ventricular hypertrophy (hi-PER-tro-fe)
An overriding aorta


Ventricular Septal Defect
The heart has a wall that separates the two chambers on its left side from the two chambers on its right side. This wall is called a septum. The septum prevents blood from mixing between the two sides of the heart. A VSD is a hole in the part of the septum that separates the ventricles, the lower chambers of the heart. The hole allows oxygen-rich blood from the left ventricle to mix with oxygen-poor blood from the right ventricle.

Pulmonary Stenosis
This defect is a narrowing of the pulmonary valve and the passage through which blood flows from the right ventricle to the pulmonary artery.
Normally, oxygen-poor blood from the right ventricle flows through the pulmonary valve, into the pulmonary artery, and out to the lungs to pick up oxygen. In pulmonary stenosis, the heart has to work harder than normal to pump blood, and not enough blood reaches the lungs.


Right Ventricular Hypertrophy
This defect occurs if the right ventricle thickens because the heart has to pump harder than it should to move blood through the narrowed pulmonary valve.

Overriding Aorta
This is a defect in the aorta, the main artery that carries oxygen-rich blood to the body. In a healthy heart, the aorta is attached to the left ventricle. This allows only oxygen-rich blood to flow to the body.
In tetralogy of Fallot, the aorta is between the left and right ventricles, directly over the VSD. As a result, oxygen-poor blood from the right ventricle flows directly into the aorta instead of into the pulmonary artery to the lungs.

Outlook
Together, these four defects mean that not enough blood is able to reach the lungs to get oxygen, and oxygen-poor blood flows out to the body. This needs open heart surgery to be repaired.

This is scary stuff for us, but with repair the outlook is good. She will never be a track star, but that's OK with us. We have been asked several times why we are adopting a little girl with a bum heart. (that's how I like to describe it) The answer is simple, we felt a connection with her, and she will die in China as a young adult if this is not repaired. As many of you know, Matt was adopted when he was 3 1/2 and he did not have a medical condition that threatened his life, but the environmental situations that he was involved in through the foster care system, he would have chosen a different, most likely more delinquent, path in life. Matt felt VERY strongly that we bring her into our family. I guess you can say he is "paying it forward" So no, she is not perfect, but who is? We feel that a lovely little girl who will enrich our lives as much as we will enrich hers, and we can't wait to bring her home!

Our Duaghter An Banyun.... Mia is here!!!

Ok So I know that everyone is dying to see her so I'll post her pictures first. Keep in mind that we have to put a smile on her face and that they shave all the babies heads to keep the lice away. Also she looks much bigger than she actually is because they have several layers of clothing on her. The do not keep the heat very high in the orphanages, so it is common for the children to wear 4-5 layers of clothing. She is actually only 22 pounds and 2 feet 8 inches tall, that means she will wear 12-18 month clothes. She is a quite a little peanut! We just think that she is precious and can't wait to get her home! (The middle photo is my favorite!)

So here is what we know about her. Banyun (mia) was found abandoned at the orphanage gate on September 25, 2007. They determined her birthday to be March 10, 2007 according to her growth and development. She was abandoned at approximately 6 months old. There was no note attached to her. We can only assume that her birth family could not care for her or was unable to provide her with the medical treatment that she needs. I'm sure it was a difficult decision for her birth parents to make.

Banyun (mia) likes to eat steamed eggs, milk, noodles, congee, and fruit. She likes rocking horses, tricycles, looking at books, being read to, and playing with dolls. When she plays outside she likes to slide and swing. She likes to play hide and seek and likes to be cuddled :) She plays peacefully with other children, does not grab their toys, and shares her cookies. She is a deep sleeper (woohoo!), she can imitate drawing Ines, she can place objects in and out of cups, she can stack blocks, she can turn pages of a book, she knows big and small and her colors. She speaks in sentences (in Mandarin Chinese though), and she knows her body parts.

Her personality is described as timid and shy (the boys will quickly change that I'm sure!) She enjoys music and toys. She likes to play peekaboo and hide and seek. She is talkative, has a ready smile (wish we could see it), and gets along well with others. She has a close bond with her caretaker.

Mia (Banyun) is in Children's Welfare Institute of Xi'an China.

Xi'an has cold and snowy winters and hot and humid summers. It is most famous for it's Terracotta Warriors that we carved during the first Qin Dynasty to deter invasion of the countryside. That will be really cool to see.

We are hoping to travel to China in May or June to get her. We will spend 2 weeks in China with her, so that will be an awesome adventure! It is difficult to determine what is exactly wrong with her heart. The ultrasound report does not really make sense, but it is apparent that it is one of 2 major defects. When we get her home we will have her heart examined and are prepared to have the surgery completed as soon as possible. I will be sending her a care package to the orphanage for her birthday.

We have sent a letter to China asking to adopt her and promising to love her as if she was one of our own. They have 2 weeks to agree to our adoption, they never disagree, it's just a formality. Next is updating all of our paperwork.... all over again! We will move as quickly as we can on this because the sooner the paperwork is done, the sooner we can go get her!!

Thanks for everyone's support and well wishes! We will keep everyone updates as this process moves along.