Happiest Thanksgiving

Well this thanksgiving we have a lot of thank you's to hand out. I'm thankful for Dr. Permut the surgeon who performed Henry's first surgery as well as all of the nurses and staff and Seattle Children's Hospital. Everyone worked very hard to fix him up and he is "the best hypoplastic left heart syndrome baby he has ever seen". He may have said one of the best.. but either way.. doc says he's doing great. So, we are ALL extremely thankful for that. I'm thankful for everyone who is helping us out by lending their prayers, time and money.  It's been a hard 2 months for us but it is slowly getting back to what I think a normal life would be with twins.

The day after Thanksgiving we charged ahead into Christmas.  Lydia watched the classic 1964 Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  We spent a quiet day at home with our kids without any major problems.  It was pretty close to "relaxing"! Thanks TV!

(FYI you can click the image to make it bigger)

Eating

I am so proud of Henry!! After he pulled his feeding tube out on Sunday night he has made remarkable progress! He is eating enough all by himself. Tomorrow we get him weighed to make sure he is getting enough calories to gain weight. I sure hope so then we can be done with that tube!!

Baby steps on a diverging path

We're all getting a little better at this. My parents Bob and Donna have been here helping out immensly. I've been able to get to work a couple of days to deploy my project that needs finishing. Dr. Hardy says Henry is doing super. That's encouraging since we end up second guessing how things are going. He's gaining weight slow and steady. Liam on the other hand is an eating machine. We don't have an accurate enough scale but we can tell that he is heavier in comparison. Hopefully it won't end up like the movie Twins where Liam is Arnold Schwarzenegger and Henry is Danny DeVito.

We'll be needing lots of help once my folks leave. The problem is we don't have an easy way to let people know what help we need and when. So, I think I'll be setting up a shared google calendar so people coordinate help for us. People can sign up for days to come over and lend a hand, hold a baby, play with Lydia, drop off dinner, or whatever. And we can request help for certain days on there too ( I think ). I'll link that here when it's ready. In the meantime... feel free to drop us a link or email if you're inclined.

And what you've been waiting for... more photos, and a video!

Henry at Home

Wow, what a crazy few days. We got to go home on Thursday the 29th, a month and a day after first getting to Seattle Children's Hospital. The drive home was comical at times. Lets just say everyone made it home in one piece.

Being at home with both our boys is absolutely wonderful. I feel so lucky and happy that we have made it successfully this far. Henry is healing great and has even begun nursing some. He still will need his feeding tube for some time though. We're all a little concerned about heading into this flu season. I really hope we don't have to be hospitalized again.

For now, we are just taking it day by day. We both thought that having 2 healthy twins would be so much easier than this. The daily routine we are finally settling into is kinda tough.

Again, thank you so much to everyone who sent care packages, gifts, notes, and prayers. I am still struck by the outpouring of support in all forms. It has all made it easier to cope. Now if we could just get some good sleep...

No tube (briefly)

Henry sleeping without any tubes.  This is before he had to have his feeding tube back in.  We're working hard on getting him to learn how to eat on his own.  This is a really hard thing to do.

Out of the ICU

As scary as being in the ICU is it's a little scarier to be moved to the "floor". We don't have a dedicated nurse and people don't exactly come running if you need something. I know it means that he's healed up enough to be there.. I hope. It's just not the same feeling leaving your baby alone in a room if there isn't going to be someone there all the time to watch them. I might be spending tonight in the recliner next to him.

Henry is doing great lately!

Again I want to say a huge thank you to everyone who has provided their support to us. We are truly overwhelmed and humbled by it all. Especially Matt & Christine Clark (& Dylan) who have continually brought us food and broken us out of this place to keep us in good spirits.

So, now for the Hupdate. He's back to being a baby again! We might even move out of the ICU by tomorrow which means he will be off all medications and only 1 IV for emergencies in his foot. Basically he'll be (mostly) wireless. He'll still have a feeding tube to supplement until he learns to eat again for the first time. We are both so excited and happy to see him looking so good. Now we can hear his little voice and hold him. It's so amazing! What a change in 1 week!

Things are happening

I just got back from lunch and now Henry has a few less things attached to him! Things are surely picking up after a lot of days of waiting. Now he's slowly being weened off of medicines and the ventilator. Also, today he started getting Mom's milk (through a feeding tube) at an amazingly slow rate. 1cc per hour which is much slower than even your average leaky sink dripping. This will ramp up as more things start getting removed and before you know it we'll be out of the ICU and moved to the regular cardiac recovery area. Hooray for Henry!

For the benefit of Henry

Joanna has set up an account that people can deposit gifts for the care of Henry. There is no obligation at all. Some people were asking how they could help so Joanna set up this account to make it easy for people to help out. Here's a copy of her email with the information:

Hi everyone -

There is a benefit account setup for Henry Becker and his family. People have been wondering what they can do for the Becker's so if anyone wants to drop a couple of dollars into this account it will help defray some of the costs of being in Seattle and some medical bills that have already started.

If you live in Missoula you can stop by any Missoula Federal Credit Union branch and make a check out to:

For Benefit of Henry Becker

If you live out of town you can send a check made out to the same but mail it to:

For Benefit of Henry Becker
c/o Missoula Federal Credit Union
126 W Spruce St
Missoula, MT 59802

The account # of 256644 can be written on the memo field but is not necessary. The bank will try to include the name of who is depositing on the slip and forward any notes or cards to Polly and Rob but they can’t guarantee this will always happen. So if you send a check and want Rob and Polly to know you may want to follow up with an email or letter to their address.

Please feel free to forward this on to anyone who would like to receive the information (I know I don't have a complete list of email addresses).

Please don't feel like there is any obligation. We just wanted to make it easier for people to help out if they wanted to.

Thanks –
Joanna

Slow & Steady

I know.. I know... it's been a while without any updates. We had a bit of a rough weekend after Henry's surgery. He started to slip after the great results on Thursday. Saturday they found that he had an infection which was really sabotaging his recovery. He's on antibiotics. Now he has apparently "turned the corner" and is getting better after a couple day setback. He still has a lot of work to do to get back to being our beautiful baby boy.

Thankful

Everyone can take a nice deep breath. I think all of the prayers are working. The operation went great! Thank you so much for keeping us in your thoughts and prayers today. We cleared the first big hurdle.

Day -1

It's like NASA over here. We've got both babies back together finally. They are very cozy together and I know they like to be together. So we took some pictures which are here. Today there isn't much to do. We are talking to the people who will be involved in the surgery and getting time to hold him before tomorrow.

We start bright and early tomorrow at 7am.. we will be here at 6. He goes to the OR around 9am and should be done around noonish. So those are the times to take a moment to think of Henry if you like.

Thanks for your support everyone!

All together now

Well, everyone is back together now. Chuck & Linda drove Polly, Lydia, and Liam over on Sunday. They had a long drive and got in very late. There was a huge dust storm and lots of accidents on the highway so they had to take a detour. The kids were fantastic on the drive and fell asleep before getting here. Poor Lydia was so tired. I carried her up to the room and she didn't even wake up to know it was me. Then in the middle of the night she woke up disoriented and was so excited to see me. We had a nice hug and she went back to sleep after I told her that I'd still be there in the morning.

Everyone is adjusting to this new "lifestyle". Thankfully we all got some better sleep than the first night. We are all very busy taking care of the kids and trying to fit in hospital visits and naps if possible. I have much less time and brain power to update here and respond to emails so please understand if my responses are short and to the point at the expense of tact.

Today at 2 we meet the surgeons and get the full disclosure and give consent for the procedure. Nothing exciting happening.. they just answer our questions and tell us about the process.

My future's so bright.. I gotta wear shades

Don't be alarmed I'm just catching some rays. (same as you might bring a newborn out into the sunshine to help with jaundice) I'm totally fine. --Henry

I thought this was actually a combination of cute and hilarious. Maybe it's virtual reality and he's on vacation somewhere... maybe it's the new fashion... maybe you can come up with your own funny ideas in the comments...

I think I'm turning Japanese

I moved over to the Ronald McDonald House which is right near the hospital. So now we've got a room for Polly, Rob, Liam, Lydia and Linda (and maybe Chuck for a few days?) to all squash in to. It got me thinking that it's like the Japanese culture where the entire family (grand parents, parents and kids) all live together. It will be cozy but they have all types of things to help us out. Play room for Lydia, volunteers to make dinner on weekdays, kitchens, your own bathroom.. and on it goes! We are in room 269. A quick googling reveals their address: 5130 40th Ave NE, Seattle, WA and homepage: http://www.rmhcseattle.org/

Plus if anyone has "I think I'm turning Japanese" by the Vapors.. I really want to hear it now.

Tom Petty was right...

Surgery is scheduled for Thursday Oct 8th at 7am (unless he gets bumped earlier for some reason). Now it's just the waiting game...

We're feeling good

First let me say a huge thank you to everyone for their support during this challenging time. It's been very hard to adjust to this surprise. It's devastating to hear that your baby may not make it but I'm feeling better about it. As I learn about it and get over the shock I'm getting optimistic. His case is favorable for a number of reasons. Also I learned the success rate for the 3 surgeries are 80-90% depending on who you ask. So while it's not a sure thing by any means and the outcome of a "success" can be different in different cases... I'm feeling good.

Also, it looks like the rest of the family will be coming out here soon so the bros will be reunited.

Contact Info - Seattle Children's Hospital

If anyone needs to get in touch with me you can call the ICU desk 206-987-2040 and ask for Henry's Dad (that's me!) and they will transfer it in to the room 4276. My cell phone must be off when I'm in there so the other best way is to email or text to robrbecker [at] gmail [dot] com

Pray for Henry

A day after birth there were some clues that something was wrong with one of the babies. He was a too sleepy to nurse most times and was a little paler than brother. He had some trouble keeping stable glucose levels. All in all was was acting pretty normal though. Thankfully a diligent nurse (Robin I believe, thanks!) correlated feeding times and glucose levels and got the ball rolling that there might be something wrong. After the doctor heard a heart murmor and an EKG we learned that Henry has a malformed heart. Without an operation on his heart he would very likely not live. It is called Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. This is very difficult to write, but everyone needs to know what is going on and my text plan is getting overwhelmed. (Please don't stop texting your support though)

The decision was made to bring Henry to Seattle Children's Hospital with me. Polly and Liam are currently still at Community Medical recovering and should be discharged soon. Henry is in very capable hands here. They keep great watch on him and he is comfortable and stable. Wednesday morning (9/30) the cardiology team and surgeons and everyone meets to decide the plan of action. The surgery will be sometime before the end of next week. I'll know after tomorrow if it will be sooner or later. They are not in an emergency rush since his heart is not nearly as bad as some.

So that is the update for now. Please pray for Henry he needs to get healthy and get back to his twin brother and Mommy.

See more photos here

How many of what now?

I'm posting here finally after a long break. The most amazing thing happened a few months ago. We went in for an ultrasound for Polly's 2nd pregnancy. Well, as the gray static moved around and Jeannie pointed out the blob that was our baby, I wondered... well what's THAT blob then? a few seconds after, Jeannie noticed and just like that.. we had TWINS. What a family accelerator!? From 1 to 3 like that? Woah this was overwhelming. I think I need 2 lunches to think this over. (Yes, I ordered what I thought was a soup & sandwich combo, and got 2 meals.. soup and sandwich. Completely ironic, yes)

Fast forward to Sept 26th.. Polly's belly is very large with 2 babies and they are 5lb 10oz last time we checked... No real signs of labor yet so I decide it's a great time to paint the kitchen of course. Somebody had to do it! It was half painted with a color called "Mars Mist" which as the name implies is kind of nebulous and creepy. So Polly and Lydia went off to Alberton to be taken care of by Linda.... with a payload of about 30lbs of concord grapes we had picked from our neighbor Dan (thanks!). They were going to make jelly and I would finish off the kitchen. Great.

Except about 3/4 of the way through the 2nd coat of "Thyme" colored paint (a much better name and color for the kitchen) Polly called and said her water just broke. Yowza, time to clean up this mess!

I threw together some things and off to the hospital where our brand new babies were born.

Welcome to the world:

Liam Riggs Becker - 12:29AM 5lb15oz 19 3/4 inches

Henry Reed Becker - 12:30AM 6lb 19 1/4 inches

(note: weight and lengths may be slightly off or interchanged.. I'm doing this from memory. But they are within 1oz and 1inch so, pretty much identical.)

Christmas in July

I'm proud to announce my new project at work has launched! I've been working on setting up an online store for the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. Our initial roll-out has a collection of exclusive holiday cards but we will be adding more in the future. This is really exciting since the RMEF now gets 100% of the proceeds for mission work!! So, check out our new store and pick up some cards for only about a dollar each and support the RMEF mission. That's way cheaper than a greeting card at the store for sure.