Hello and welcome to my daughter Brittney�s memorial pages.
I�m sharing this story as a tribute to her and hopefully it will help other grieving parents.
My name is Trish and my husband is Chester.
We are proud parents to a beautiful daughter, Brittney Cheyanne, whom only got to spend a short time with us.
In August 1999, I found out I was expecting my first child.
Chester and I were so excited.
We immediately started planning our lives for a new baby.
My whole pregnancy went very well with no complaints other than the usual minor pregnancy symptoms.
After hours of labor, Brittney Cheyanne, made her entrance into the world on May 24, 2000 at 10:26 pm.
She weighed 7lbs 13.5 oz and was 20 inches long.
At 5 minutes old, she received a 10 on the Apgar scale.
Tears of joy filled the room as we admired our beautiful daughter.
No doubt about it, she was a spitting image of her daddy.
The following day, Thursday, the pediatrician was concerned about Brittney, as she wasn�t eating very much and was continuously spitting up and running a mild fever.
After a thorough checkup, the Dr. informed Chester and I that he did hear a heart murmur and she would be transferred to another hospital for further testing.
At the time, this hospital did not specialize in cardiology.
Brittney was transferred to the University of Kentucky on Friday.
After several tests and hours waiting, we were told the results shows complex congenital heart defects that would require surgery.
The most serious was a condition called Interrupted Aortic Arch (IAA) in which the aorta is divided.
Along with this condition was also Ventricular Septal Defect (VSD) an opening in the ventricular septum that separates the right and left ventricles;
Atrial Septal Defect (ASD) hole between the upper two chambers of the heart.
Brittney would be put on medication to keep the PDA vessel open (which usually closes immediately after birth) and would be required to undergo open-heart surgery.
Her daddy and I were devastated after hearing all the results.
Once again, we were told she would be transferred to another hospital since there was no pediatric cardiologist present at this hospital.
Late Friday night Brittney was transferred to Kosair Children Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky.
She would remain there in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) until her surgery.
On Monday May 29, 2000, Brittney underwent open-heart surgery.
She was only six days old.
It was heart breaking for them to wheel her away not knowing if I would ever see her alive again.
Surgery last for nine hours and it was the longest nine hours of my life.
Chester and I clung tight to one another as we received updates frequently, none of the kind we wanted to hear.
Brittney�s heart and lungs were too weak to work on their own after surgery making it severely difficult getting oxygen into her blood.
Chester and I gave permission for Brittney to be placed on the ECMO (extra-corporeal membrane oxygenation) machine.
This machine will supply an artificial lung outside the body to place the needed oxygen in her blood and also act as an artificial heart.
Risks of this machine was blood clotting, increased risk of infections, and it would also require Brittney receiving frequent blood transfusions.
We knew it didn�t sound good but this was her only chance of survival.
Days turned into weeks with hardly any improvement.
After receiving pacemaker the ECMO flow on the machine was turned down allowing Brittney�s heart try working on its own.
However, her heart and lungs wasn�t strong enough to work on their own, so the ECMO flow was turned back up.
All we could do was pray and stand by our daughter�s bedside to spend all the precious time we could with her.
We wanted a miracle to happen.
We wanted our Baby girl to get well, although doctors told us nothing was improving.
Brittney had to receive blood transfusions more frequently, blood clots were forming, infections were increasing, and organs were failing to work without the help of machines.
The first of July it broke my heart to look at my daughter.
She was lying there so lifeless and had to be sedated at all times.
Her entire body was so swollen; there was no way for her to open her eyes.
She looked as if she would burst like a balloon.
I wanted to help her, wanted to make everything better for her, but no possible way I could.
I was a helpless mother staring at my daughter only hanging on by a thread.
The third of July the doctors sat her daddy and I down for a discussion about Brittney.
My heart fell down to my feet when he spoke his words to me, � Your daughter has no chance of getting any better.
She has excessive buildup of fluid, hemorrhaging of the urinary bladder, major abnormalities of the heart and lungs with one lung collapsed, liver and kidney failure, emphysema, and brain damage.
It is now your decision as her parents to turn the machines off and let her be at peace or let her stay on them lying there lifeless like a vegetable.�
Everything was running through my mind.
I didn�t understand how this could be, why did it happen to me, I wanted my daughter with me, she needed me, I wanted her smile to be the first thing I saw in the mornings and the last thing I saw at night, I loved her.
Deep down though, I knew it couldn�t happen like this.
It was at this time my husband and I decided that Brittney had been through so much that the machines would be turned off and she would be pain free as God�s Little Angel.
Losing my daughter, Brittney, has been a horrible experience and one I will never get over.
Like all grieving parents, I have my good days and my bad.
Some days I think of her and smile but others I think of her and cry.
As I write this, tears roll down my cheeks as I remember her daddy and I standing on each side of her bed and she would roll her eyes back and forth to each of us and then up to her little musical toy as if she was saying �Hello, could someone please make this thing go again.�
Time with my daughter was short as she was just one month and nine days old when she became a beautiful angel, but the memories of her will last a lifetime.
Interrupted Aortic Arch
