Cardiology Visit

This is from a billion years ago.  I started it and then never finished it... until now:

Maren had a scheduled visit to cardiology about 3 weeks ago.  She was very excited about it, too.  I'm not sure how long dangling 4 chicken nuggets from McDonalds in front of Maren's face will make these visits worth her while, but I'm gonna milk that obsession of hers while I can!

I'll start by saying Maren looks awesome and is doing so very well.  She's very happy-- cracks herself up and everyone around her.  I can't believe she's coming up on 5 years... but that's another post. 

So the visit went well... I think.  It's always hard to tell.  The doctors always seem to walk in with a hand over one eye after looking at her chart from the previous visit.  Her sats were good.  Her tricuspid regurgitation seems to be "slightly improved." Her heart function is essentially unchanged.  Her heart function isn't great, but her body seems to be okay with that.  When I asked the doctor if he expected her heart function to get better with time his response, after a little bit of a sigh and a long enough pause for me to figure out on my own what he was going to say, was, "we hope it will get better." It's either gonna get better or worse.  Like I said, right now it's obviously sufficient and I'm not complaining one bit.

One thing that the doctor seemed to be a little concerned about was the fact that Maren's heart rate was slower than in past visits.  I asked if that was an issue and what I understood is that it's a problem if there are other symptoms... like frequent headaches, dizziness, and falling down.  Maren does complain of headaches quite often, but she wears glasses-- or at least she's supposed to.  I'm more likely to find her glasses on the floor, in the toilet, in the backyard, etc. than on her face, and that may be causing the headaches.  She doesn't complain about being dizzy, but she falls down all the time.  I don't think that means much, though.  Besides the fact that she's got weak muscles, falling down is in her genes.  Have you met Henry? We blame Grandpa Dennis for that.  He was kind of clumsy from what I understand. 

So the plan is to have her set up with a 24-hour holter monitor and see how things are going.  The idea of having a pace maker put in was thrown around, but this test will tell.  Not too excited about the idea but there are definitely worse things. 

***UPDATE***

Holter looked good.  I think the doctor said it was "boring."  Boring is good!  We're hoping for a very boring few months between now and when Maren goes back at the beginning of the year. 
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