My dd, 11 years old (she'll be 12 in August), is a serious ballet student. She dances 5 days a week. This winter was also my dd's first ballet summer intensive audition season. Ballet students all over the country spend weekend days during January and February, and even in to March traveling to and auditioning for these programs, and dd did this for the first time this year. She auditioned for 2 programs that are back east (we live in California), and one more local program. She was accepted into her top choice - one of the schools back east, and the local program, and was waitlisted for the 3rd program - the other one that is back east. What we didn't understand back in January - when she was first accepted - was that being accepted to a program doesn't guarantee you a spot in the program. Since we realized a couple of months ago that they accept far more people than they can accomodate (a lot like college), we've been waiting (and waiting and waiting) to find out if she really gets to go after all. (as well as wishing we hadn't told everyone she was going until we knew for sure - 
). We sent in her registration fees, paperwork, etc. as soon as we got them, and have been checking the mailbox religiously for weeks - finally today she got the confirmation that she's in for sure. So, it's all very exciting, and daunting.
She'll live in a dorm there for 4 weeks, and dance 5 days a week for 4 hours a day. On the one hand - I can't believe we're actually letting her do this - go 3000 miles away from us to study ballet. Ballet! On the other hand, I admire her so much for working so hard, and going through the audition process, etc. I'm just thankful we can afford to support her dreams. We are very lucky in that regard.
Now for the not so good news...I've not been on this board regularly for awhile, but I know I've posted years ago about that my son has congenital heart defects (the origin of my username). He's had a number of surgeries to correct the defects - and other surgeries/procedures to update the original corrections. But he hasn't had any surgery or other procedures for 8 1/ 2 years now. He does have periodic exams by the cardiologist - and he always will. At his January visit, his cardio found a problem with one of his original repair sites - he was born with an extreme narrowing and kink in his aorta (one of his 4 heart defects), which they repaired twice when he was still an infant. Well, now that he's 13 - and 5'7" and 125 lbs. the original repair site isn't keeping up with his growth - and he has high blood pressure. So, the cardio scheduled an MRI for ds, which he had done about 3 weeks ago. Ds was a very good sport about the MRI, and actually had us laughing with his description of what he went through. (It took an hour and a half!).
We've been waiting since then to find out whether or not ds will have to have surgery. The cardio finally called today, and said the surgeon still hasn't called him back (!), but that the MRI confirmed what he had suspected, and ds will definitely have to have some work done on his aorta. We all pretty much figured that out in January, and understood that the info from the MRI would just help them figure out the best way to fix his aorta. The bummer is that if they do need to surgery - which is what the cardio suspects - they'll have to go in from the front again, and put him on bypass. Ugh. Usually with aortic surgery, they can go in through the side, and they don't have to go through the sternum, etc. So that was not what I wanted to hear. There is still a chance, though, that the surgeon will want to try to place a stent in the aorta rather than do surgery. Keep your fingers crossed!
Anyway, weird day. Ds is handling all this so well. He amazes me. Thanks for listening!
). We sent in her registration fees, paperwork, etc. as soon as we got them, and have been checking the mailbox religiously for weeks - finally today she got the confirmation that she's in for sure. So, it's all very exciting, and daunting.She'll live in a dorm there for 4 weeks, and dance 5 days a week for 4 hours a day. On the one hand - I can't believe we're actually letting her do this - go 3000 miles away from us to study ballet. Ballet! On the other hand, I admire her so much for working so hard, and going through the audition process, etc. I'm just thankful we can afford to support her dreams. We are very lucky in that regard.
Now for the not so good news...I've not been on this board regularly for awhile, but I know I've posted years ago about that my son has congenital heart defects (the origin of my username). He's had a number of surgeries to correct the defects - and other surgeries/procedures to update the original corrections. But he hasn't had any surgery or other procedures for 8 1/ 2 years now. He does have periodic exams by the cardiologist - and he always will. At his January visit, his cardio found a problem with one of his original repair sites - he was born with an extreme narrowing and kink in his aorta (one of his 4 heart defects), which they repaired twice when he was still an infant. Well, now that he's 13 - and 5'7" and 125 lbs. the original repair site isn't keeping up with his growth - and he has high blood pressure. So, the cardio scheduled an MRI for ds, which he had done about 3 weeks ago. Ds was a very good sport about the MRI, and actually had us laughing with his description of what he went through. (It took an hour and a half!).
We've been waiting since then to find out whether or not ds will have to have surgery. The cardio finally called today, and said the surgeon still hasn't called him back (!), but that the MRI confirmed what he had suspected, and ds will definitely have to have some work done on his aorta. We all pretty much figured that out in January, and understood that the info from the MRI would just help them figure out the best way to fix his aorta. The bummer is that if they do need to surgery - which is what the cardio suspects - they'll have to go in from the front again, and put him on bypass. Ugh. Usually with aortic surgery, they can go in through the side, and they don't have to go through the sternum, etc. So that was not what I wanted to hear. There is still a chance, though, that the surgeon will want to try to place a stent in the aorta rather than do surgery. Keep your fingers crossed!
Anyway, weird day. Ds is handling all this so well. He amazes me. Thanks for listening!
!
. That's probably just as good as whatever my old dreams were. 
