Holden's Hope September

Meet Wyatt. Isn't he just beautiful!?! We have been so lucky the past three months to have the sweetest families and kidos for the Holden's Hope shirt! Wyatt is a super sweet, playful and active 1 year old little boy. You would never know by looking at him that he has Congestive Heart Failure.

Wyatt is one of three boys in his family. He has one older brother named Aubrey and a younger one named Cohen {I love all three of their names : )} When Aubrey was 4, his Mommy and Daddy {Kevin and Jessica} started trying to have another baby. They had a hard time conceiving and even had a miscarriage so when they found out that Jessica was pregnant with Wyatt they were beyond excited! At 15 weeks, they found out they were going to add a sweet little boy to their family and at 20 week they found out something may be wrong with his heart.

After seeing many specialist, Jessica and Kevin learned their sweet baby did have something wrong with his heart. He has a very rare and serious heart defect called Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. This means the left side of his heart is very undeveloped and this makes it useless. His heart could not be fixed but something would have to be done. If they decided to do nothing then Wyatt would only live a few days. They doctors decided to do they they would need to do a series of three surgeries to reroute the blood flow and extend his life only to get his to adult hood where he would need a heart transplant.

When Wyatt was born, the doctors watched him very closely and monitored at Children's Heathcare of Atlanta where at 4 days old he had his first surgery. He came thru the surgery wonderfully and was hope in two weeks. His next surgery came at 4 months old and he did so well he was home in 5 days! Wow! After that surgery, Jessica and Kevin went home with their two sweet boys and planned on living their life as normal as they could since Wyatt wasn't due to have another surgery until he was 2.

When winter came, Wyatt continued to stay sick over and over for 6 weeks. After many rounds of antibiotics and nothing seeing to be working, they took Wyatt back to the hospital. While at the hospital, they found out that his heart wasn't as well as the thought and they were going to keep an eye on it.

The following month after a visit to the cardiologist, they Wyatt was sent back to the hospital so that they could figure out why Wyatt had been getting so sick. It turned out that Wyatt had not been sick at all. His coughing and other symptoms were actually symptoms of Congestive Heart Failure. Wyatt's heart was failing him and no surgery could help.

Kevin and Jessica's only options were to put Wyatt on a heart transplant list or do nothing and enjoy the time that they had with him.

On March 10, 2010, Wyatt was placed on the heart transplant list listed as a stage 2 transplant candidate. As a stage 2, he can wait for a heart at home, but the wait is longer since he is not in critical condition.

In May, he was moved to stage 1B since his heart is causing him to no longer grow or develop. And that is where he stands today.

I think this may be the hardest shirt and post that I have ever had to make. This little boy needs out prayers and thoughts as much as we can give! He is such an amazing little boy and I can't wait to see pictures of him in a year, two, three and more of how well he will be doing! So lets lift him up and pray for that new heart that Wyatt needs!

Wyatt also has a new website called Wyatt's Heart and you can also follow his story on his Facebook page by clicking HERE.