Sunday May 30

Hi All,
Just a quick note to let you know that I'm still feeling great and have since I was released. My weekly biopsies are returning some good news and the meds are coming down in both dosage and frequency. Getting off the prednisone will be great.
D and I saw some good friends last evening and had a blast. I'll be doin more of that soon. Went to the flea market this morning to get out a lil while. It was a beautiful day to be out.
I plan on spending quite a bit of this summer outside. D and I are excited about geocaching. Never heard of it? Look it up. We're starting soon. Just trying out some equipment first. See if her phone may work in some situations. (Now, you gotta look it up)
I'll be talkin to you all soon.
Keep checking the blog for the transplant story.
See ya around,
~R

fri. May 28th

Hi All,
As promised I'll be blogging again. (See, I am now...Ta Da)
Forgot to mention yesterday that there be a short article about my transplant in the Latrobe Bulletin soon. Maybe Saturday. It's basically everything you already know so, no biggie.
I've been bumping into some of you here and there and it's been great. I am getting stronger and will be visiting you very soon. (been needing to get out for a while) I have plans to get together will my brothers (Ed n Johnny) along with the rest of the maniacs this holiday weekend and I'm pretty pumped for that. Hope all of you have a safe and great holiday. Just don't forget the reason we have the long weekend. Honor those who fought and died and even up with ridicule and blame by some ingrates, our American soldiers. God Bless Them.
Talk to you soon,
~R

Thursday 27th

Hi All,
It has been awhile since I blogged... Richard is doing very well. Looking at him, it is hard to believe that he just had a heart transplant! He is starting to feel better and has a lot of energy at times. Soon he will be running circles around me and I'll have to change my behavior to keep up.

Once a week he goes back to AGH for a day of testing to check for rejection and to see what his levels are at for various things, for example blood sugar. Today's testing all went well. The doctors continue to look at his progress with a smile and amazement. They are very happy with how he is doing. Good progress means, that the medications he is taking gets reduced and that is always a good thing.
Richard is going to blogg himself, he promises, in the next few days. We are trying to settle in to our place and get some-kind of schedule going.

We hope that you take the time this holiday weekend to be with your families and enjoy this special time together.
Lots of love Dee and Rich

Thursday, May 13th / HOME!

10 days after Richard's heart transplant and we are home! God has been so good! He is looking great, a lot of color. He is walking around, by himself! He will need to continue to get a lot of rest for now and keep his feet up.

For the next few weeks, he will not be going out into public places and will need to keep his visits with you to a minimum. His rejection rate is very high for a few months and is very susceptible to germs and getting sick. They compare him to a new born baby as far has his immunity is concerned. We do plan on having a big get together in a few weeks to see all of you!

All our / your prayers continue to be answered. First we got the heart really fast ( 10 days on the waiting list), unheard of! We prayed for a young and good heart. They tell us the heart is in the 20's and in very good condition! We have pictures to show those of you who are not squeamish! We prayed that he would not have issues with Diabetes, which can be an issue with the meds he is on. The doctor told us yesterday that so far, this is not an issue and they are surprised that he is going home without meds for Diabetes! We prayed that he did not have to go home with any drains and this also was the case.

We thank all of you for your continued prayers and faithfulness! Her are the things we are praying for now: Rejection - we do not want this to be any issue of any sort
High Blood Pressure
Post-transplant Diabetes
Infection
CMV Infection
Graft Coronary Disease
Cancer of the skin or immune system

We are thanking God ahead of time to keep him protected from all of the above issues and to heal quickly without complications. As stated before, we have thousands of people praying and Good had to show up in a BIG WAY and answer all of our prayers! He can do the same for you!
I am hoping that Richard will have the strength to pick back up on the blog starting tomorrow...
Good night and God bless,

Thursday, May 13th morning

Hello all,
just a quick update... We are still at AGH. We are hoping that Rich will get released today. This is pending on the drainage. He may come home with one and go back in a few days to have it taken out.

We'll keep you posted... Have a great day

Wed May 12th 7:30 AM

Good morning all,
Amanda was just in and took out two of four drain tubes. The heart caf from yesterday is good overall, just still a lot of fluid on board. Looks like tomorrow will be the go home day. Today will be a day of getting rid of fluids...... He is doing well and very anxious to get home.. However, he does not want to come back for a chest tube for additional liquids like last time (too painful).

Hang in there.. Keep you posted

Monday 10th, 6:50 PM

In a few hours, it will be one week since Dr. Baiely came out of the operating room to give us the great news that Richard was doing well after surgery! Things have happened so fast, and have gone so well, that we have to pinch ourselves sometimes to make sure it is all real!

Richard continues to get exercise by walking around the halls, followed by putting his feet up. Looks like he will be coming home later this week, maybe by Thursday. We want to make sure all is well, before we venture out of here.

He has had many visitors from the Cardiac team, Transplant team and also our friend Rosie... He is looking forward to getting home and seeing all of you very soon. He also received pictures from his operation and will share them with those of you who want to see them. I wasn't sure myself if I wanted to see them.. I have and they sure are educational.
Spend time with those you love.... Good night

Sunday May 9th

All,

Happy Mother's Day to those it applies to! It was great to see both of our mothers today and get to spend some time with them!

Just a quick update... Richard is doing so well it is just hard to believe! He is walking on his own and spent most of the day out of bed. Walking and talking to a bunch who visited today. He has great color and looks the best that he has for a long time. We hope to bring him home on Tuesday if all the medical data looks good at that point. It should be a 6 to 9 weeks of recovery until his incision is healed. He will be making weekly trips to the clinic for the first few months, then every other week and so on for the first year.

Get some good sleep tonight..

Prayer needed

Hello all,
We just found out that an extended family member is also here in AGH. Her name is Shantasia Kirtchell, she is 16 years old. Shantasia was in an auto accident with her boyfriend very recently. She is in critical condition.

So we are asking all of you, our prayer warriors, to pray for her too. We have seen the miracles that God had given Richard and we are expecting miracle of the like for this sweet 16 year old.

We thank you and ask the Lord to Bless you,

Sat, May 8th 10 AM

Richard got moved up stairs to a room on the 5th floor (569), late yesterday. I was able to spend the night with him ( of course not in the same bed!) . He took his first walk yesterday down the hall with assistance from Juli and a walker. Today we will take many walks around the floor to buildup his legs. There is a bunch of stuff that we have to learn before going home. We have set a goal with Juli to have everything completed by Tuesday. If all medically is in line by then, we will be able to go home!!! It is just so hard to believe that Richard has come this far so fast! The idea is to get out as soon as he can and recover at home.
God continues to give us blessing each day.....
Do something fun with your family today.
PS
comment from Richard "I can't wait to play the drums"

About 72 hours since the New Heart!

It is just amazing to realize that Richard got his new heart about three days ago! I went in to see him at the 2 PM visit and got him to open his eyes and look at me. I said Richard, you got a new heart, it is doing great and your doing great. He looked at me with a look of confusion and question and said "Did I get a new heart?". I assured him that he did, he gave me a great big smile and then we cried together for joy.
Of course he is still going in and out of sleep. We were able to stay with him until 6:45, so we were able to talk to him in between naps. I fed him his food (jello and broth) and around 6:30 PM he asked me again if he really did get a new heart, this time my mother helped to assure him. God has truly blessed us and everything has happen much faster than we could ever anticipated. Sometimes it is just hard to comprehend it all.
Once again thanks for your continued prayers and thoughts.
God bless and kiss you loved ones,

Thursday 6th, 11:30 AM

Just left Richard and he is doing GREAT! They tell me his numbers are perfect and just where they would want them to be. They did take his breathing tube out this morning. He looks good, has more color than he has since February 5th. They are hoping to have him awake by our 2 PM visit and by the end of the day sitting up in a chair!

This is moving so fast that my head is spinning. We are so thankful to God, all of you have been supporting (in many ways) and for all of your prayers. I can't wait to talk to him and have him realize that he has a NEW heart and it is working GREAT.

PS
Happy Birthday to cousin Bev! Heard you brought more food. Can't wait to get home to eat some because it is always GOOD. We sure are blessed to have a caterer in the family.
Let you know what Richard has to say this afternoon.

Wednesday 5th 11 AM

Good news... Richard was closed up this morning! He is progressing well and things are happening as planned. They hope to take out his breathing tube later today. Once that happens, they will bring him up to a conscience level. He then will be able to talk, but they will continue to give him pain medicines that keep him somewhat sedated. Based on our experience from the last operation in February, he will not remember much from this time period.
Thanks for all of your continued prayers,

24 hours after going into surgery

Just a quick up date.... Rich did well through the night and is still under heavy sedation. This allows his new heart and body time to get use to each other without having other functions taking energy too. His chest is still open at this time. We are waiting for the blood seepage to slow down and for some of his blood elevations to level out. Once this happens they can close him up. This is all normal stuff when you go through a transplant. Dr. Bailey is hoping to close him up later today, but it might be tomorrow..... All is good and we continue to move in the right direction. Not much to tell you at this time since it is healing time.
I want to say that the doctors, nurses and staff her at AGH continue to be very helpful, understanding and top notch! We are thankful for all of them that have gotten Richard this far..

Tuesday 4th 2:30AM

First we have to thank all of you have been praying for us... Our prayers have been answered much quicker than anticipated and in many ways! Richard was out of surgery around 10:45 PM on May 3rd. Dr. Bailey came to see us and told us that the new heart looks good, strong and it is young. The new heart is currently beating and keeping him alive! No more Heartmate II - although we were very happy to have this piece of equipment to keep him alive until this point!
We just got done visiting him for a few minutes to see that he is alive and breathing. He will be heavily sedated for a day or two. Hopefully tomorrow afternoon, they will be able to close up his chest. We are waiting for the bleeding to settle down and get under control - this is part of the normal process...
So here are the things that we are praying for now: bleeding to stop and able to close him up tomorrow, speedy healing, and no long term issues with diabetes. Short term is expected due to the high dosage of strong meds. Keep those prayers coming...
Good night.. hoping to get a few hours, so no reporting tomorrow until the afternoon.
Peace be with you..

New Heart

Monday, May 3rd at 1:00 AM we received a call that a heart had become available for Richard. He had been sick for the last few days and feeling weak. He looked at me and said I'm not ready for a heart, hoping that he would be much stronger before the operation. On the other hand we were so shocked and excited to have been called after being on the transplant list for less than two weeks! Nothing short of a Miracle and an answer to many prayers!



Thanks to Tom driving us, we arrived at the hospital around 2:30 AM and started the process to verify that Rich was ready for this heart. After many hours of waiting we were told that he would go into surgery at 1:00 PM and later this got pushed out to 3 PM.



Many of you have been asking how Richard got the heart, since he was still listed as a 1B. This meant that all of the 1As did not have a good match to this heart that became available. So they moved to the 1B list and Richard was a good match. They look for many things: blood type, size of the heart, tissue matching.....



We where told more than once that it is possible to get here, get prepared, go into surgery and then the doctor find something he doesn't like and send you home without the heart and go back on the list. This happens very seldom, but you have to keep this in mind just in case... So with many hours to wait and lots to think about Richard made the nurses & doctors laugh (we wouldn't expect anything less!), found peace with the operation and the outcome, got to sleep a few minutes in between all that was going on during the preparation. When he left he was very positive and at peace.

Will update you as soon as we hear he is out...



ok.. visiting and sending him stuff... here is a brief outline of their rules:

* No flowers, unless they are fake

* Balloons and cards are fine

* Send cards to Allegheny General Hospital

320 East North Ave

Pittsburgh, PA 15212



They will be strict on visiting hours while he is in the SICU( Surgical Intensive Care Unit), which are:

10AM-10:30AM

2:00PM-2:30PM

8:00PM-8:30PM

2 immediate family members per visit