a very brief re-cap...

for those of you visiting the blog for the first time, or for the first time in awhile…

max was born with a heart defect called a double aortic arch.  basically during development his aorta forked and grew around either side of his trachea.  he had trouble breathing at birth and at 3 days old was transferred to children's hospital in milwaukee.  it was there he was diagnosed.  at 7 days old they did heart surgery to clip the non-dominant side of the aorta.  max was in the hospital until he was 28 days old.  he had to learn to eat and breathe and swallow all at the same time.

he has recovered wonderfully.  we see a pediatric cardiologist, now once a year, to check that his heart is developing correctly and that there are no issues with the blood flow.  the doctor is fantastic and so far so good.  she is always really reassuring.

max has tracheomalacia.  which is basically a soft airway.  it causes stridor or noisy breathing.  when he was a baby he had a harder time.  things have definitely gotten better as he has grown.  the only time you can really notice it is when he is physically active, when he is sick and sometimes when he eats/drinks.  we just have to be careful with respiratory illness…more so when he was little.  until about 2 years old, almost every cold led to a doctor visit with breathing treatments/steroids/or antibiotics.  we're at a much better place now.

thanks for checking this out and for your interest in what's going on with max.
let me know if you have any questions…kellyann823@hotmail.com