Lynnea was able to come home from the hospital today, and she has been very happy and excited ever since. Unfortunately, last night, and again early this morning, there were some "irregularities" that were showing up on her EKG. It turns out she has what is known as a "heart block." Heart function has two main components: electrical (the system of electrical signals that tell the heart when, and how hard to beat), and "plumbing" (the muscle, arteries, and blood vessels that allow the heart to efficiently pump blood to the entire body). Up until now, Lynnea's heart problems have all been with the plumbing part of things, while her electrical system has been fine. Now it looks as though the electrical signals that that tell her heart when to beat are not coordinated exactly as they should be. The doctors had a discussion about it this morning, and are hoping that this problem is pretty benign. They said that, in a normal healthy adult heart, this problem wouldn't be an issue, but since Lynnea is a baby, and more importantly, the anatomy of her heart is very different from most people, they aren't exactly sure how serious this could end up being. They sent her home with a small monitor to record her EKG for 24 hours so that they can get a better look at how often her heartbeat is irregular. This will help them determine whether or not a pacemaker is something that she will need to correct the problem.
On a lighter note, I noticed today that Lynnea now has seven teeth, four on top, three on the bottom. As always, we hope that she figures out that they are for chewing food sometime soon (rather than just grinding them, which she seems to like to do, and which drives me crazy).
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