A good ticker!

So, today we visited the Cardiologist and it was an hour and a half experience. First, we had to wait for twenty minutes before we went to the examination room and then a resident assistant/Dr. lady checked him out and asked all the history questions and everything else. We were with her for half and hour and then the specialist came in that we were there to see. He did basically all of the same things that she did in about 10 minutes then we went down to look at the echo cardiogram (a.k.a. the heart ultra sound). After checking everything out he let us know that we don't have anything to worry about with Austin's heart. He said he agrees it is probably just excercise induced asthma. So we are very thankful that we have eliminated the possibility of a problem in the heart. Next, we will need to meet with our primary physician or meet with the Pulmonologist to figure out what the four nodules on his lung are and if that has anything to do with the 'asthma' diagnosis or with the chest pains that he has. So thank God for his provision with the Austin's heart and thank you for all of your prayers!

Oh, and a great part about it was that my work a.) allowed me to leave work for THREE hours and b.) I got paid for those THREE HOURS! I had to come back to work though (I am here now) and I clocked out when I got back (that's what she told me to do) but I will only be staying for approximately an additional hour. So I got two hours paid for not even being at work. Praise God, he's Amazing and Great!

One additional note, our friend Alyssa is coming into town, she's Kurt's girlfriend, to spend the weekend. So she'll be in tonight through Sunday or Monday I believe. Also, the lights festival of Michigan Avenue is this weekend on Saturday, so we'll be looking forward to that!

That's all for now folks.

Dead things and Bamboo...

So on top of all the eventful things that have been going on around us, I think the stress wore on our fish as well... I am sad to say that we had a death in our family this week, our beloved Pebbles died on Thursday morning. She had been sick for about four days or so, just 'sitting' on the bottom of the tank, and whenever she would swim it was not far off of the bottom and usually swimming off balance or sideways... bad stuff. Anyway, so now we are down to only 5 fishies. Everyone else seems to be doing well. While Pebbles was sick, I think Pirate was sympathizing with her as he would often lay next to her, I thought he may have been sick too, but when he wasn't laying next to her he was buzzing around the tank, so that showed that he wasn't sick. After she died everything was good with the others, so I'm not worried... yet. Anyway, that's our sad news. One the up side, I got bamboo!!! LOL! So, we have another 'living' thing in our apartment. I've been wanting a bamboo plant and a hibiscus plant, both of which are fairly expensive, but we got this healthy, sprouting bamboo for only $2.99 at Ikea! Well, I shall wrap it up for the evening, since I am at work, during both of these posts, lol, AND I need to work on some homework! Tata!

Emergency Room visits and Doctor check-ups...

Hello all, I'm sorry for the delay in posting this information, but it's been a crazy time with this situation and with my work schedule. So, I regret to inform you that Austin has had a visit to the ER since I've last wrote to you. Yep, fun times.

Here at Moody we have a Lifetime Fitness class both our Freshman and our Senior year. It compares how our fitness has improved or declined and what we can do to keep at a healthy weight and fitness level, etc. Well, it's come that time that Austin had to have his Senior year class. During these classes part of the comparison is based on a mile and a half run. Austin did fine in completing this during his Freshman year, just a little winded, but this time (10/28) it had an adverse affect on his body. He only finish about 4 or 5 laps of the 13 and 3/4's. Which of these laps a few were walking. He became increasingly winded until he could no longer run or walk. He had to stop and went to talk to his professor, while speaking with her he began getting very light headed and dizzy. She figured that he was experiencing an asthma attack (which he's never had one before). She sent him to the on campus health department and they gave him a few of the general tests and his heart rate 20 minutes after he had stopped walking was still up at 120 bpm. With this news the professor wouldn't allow for him to leave the fitness center until our friend Kurt came back (he's in the same class) to walk Austin out and promising to DRIVE him to the ER so that he can get checked out because of the asthma attack and the increased heart rate.

So, six hours, three different Doctor's opinions at two different places and a chest x-ray later he came home, only with a diagnosis that it was PROBABLY an asthma attack, the increased heart rate was PROBABLY only because of the constriction of the airways and SUPPOSEDLY his chest x-ray was fine. His Doctor had told him that she wanted him to follow up with her in a week, so he went back to visit her and she basically said 'I have no idea why the ER told you that the chest x-ray was fine, because we actually found four nodules on your lung'. After this she told him that she wanted him to go get another chest x-ray in order to determine whether the nodules were growing, shrinking or may be something that he has always had. Also, she wanted him to go get a heart 'ultrasound'. I went with him to get the heart 'ultrasound' which was actually a really neat experience, we saw the inside chambers and valves of his heart in 2D. Neat stuff. The chest x-rays (original and second one) would be sent to a Pulmonologist to examine and the 'ultrasound' would be sent to a Cardiologist for examination. He spoke with his Doctor once on the phone and she told him that they did find a small abnormality with his heart, but that most people who have this abnormality never even know it or do not have any noticeable affects of it. She hadn't heard anything back from the Pulmonologist yet about the x-rays. He has to go she the Cardiologist this Thursday and we'll hear what the diagnosis is about the abnormality of his heart. From there I believe we'll then have to set up an appointment with the Pulmonologist and then go back to see Dr. Batista, the family Doctor for the final on what we're doing with all of this information or if anything needs to be followed up with. So, we're still in a time of waiting.

Austin has handled everything very well, he's put it all in God's hands and is completely worry free and not nervous or scared at all. I on the other hand have been extremely anxious. It's been a lot easier lately because we haven't had to deal with it lately and I've been pretty busy with work(48 hours this week). I would appreciate prayers! :D Also, a great praise that we have to give God is that from his whole day in the emergency room ($2000 worth) our insurance has taken care of ALL of it. Yep, ALL $2000 worth! That's been a great praise. Our family Doctor told us that with our insurance we should get away with only having to pay about $40 a piece to visit the two specialists and we've had to pay the her only $25 for an office visit. So $100 to get this all taken care of! God is AMAZING! Well, we would greatly appreciate your prayers for Austin's health and God's will in this situation, and for my anxious thoughts. :) Thank you SO much to all of those that have been praying for us already. We have heard of SO many different prayer chains that are praying for us and we are so thankful that God's family comes together in times of need.

I will keep this as updated as possible, and I will post after the Cardiologist visit on Thursday to let you know what we've heard from them. Please, if you have any questions drop us an email. I've posted our email at the top of the blog now, so you can contact us. Thanks everyone!