This girl took the first big step in her heart journey today. She had a cardiac catheterization, which involved an electrophysiology study. In non technical terms, that means they used tubes and wires to check out the electrical pathways and conduction in her heart.

She did amazing. She was so much calmer than I expected before the procedure. We gave her a new sketch book and markers and she got lost in her own world of art.

She threw them a little curve ball during the procedure, it turns out she has one more little anomaly, that being that she doesn’t have venous access to her heart through her legs. Which basically means the veins from her groin that they usually use, don’t actually travel all the way to her heart in the way they’d expect. So they had to go in through her neck to do the procedure. The plan was to track down any accessory pathways, and get rid of them, but she didn’t end up having any so in a way we got lucky.

She’s home now. Resting, albeit somewhat uncomfortably. Slowly getting back to herself. She’s supposed to be back to normal by the weekend. She gets to come off one of her medications now too.

She was so brave, and did so well. I could not be more proud of her. It gave us a small glimpse of what to expect when she has her big surgery next month. It’s an experience I’m dreading, but plan to embrace and face with as much courage as she showed today.

I can do hard things. Because she has to do hard things. That mantra will be running through my head for the foreseeable future.

We can do hard things.