super kid Rainn | Congenital Heart Defect Nashville Child Photographer

b&w, babies, charity, families, studio, super kids, Uncategorized

Photographing Super Kids is one of the most rewarding parts of my job. I LOVE meeting families that have kids doing hard things and overcoming special circumstances. When Nashville was put on lockdown in March of 2020, I stopped photographing Super Kid sessions out of caution for their health and safety. I had no idea that 10 months later I would still be waiting to reopen super kid studio sessions due to COVID19. Oh how I’ve missed them so! I’m now accepting nominations for Super Kids and hope that soon we will be able to get back to these awesome sessions on a regular basis.

Today I made an exception and welcomed sweet little Rainn and his family to the studio. Rainn was born with a congenital heart defect and has already undergone 2 heart surgeries. He has been in the hospital over 70 days of his short life and today we celebrated his health and healing with a Super Kids photo session. His parents really wanted to capture him while he was little and this guy is growing quickly! He was such an absolute doll!

Rainn’s mom shared a little of his story with me: Our little heart warrior, Rainn Ericson, was born during the pandemic. He has a single ventricle heart or what is called Hypoplastic Right Heart Syndrome. This is a sporadic and rare congenital heart defect. Basically, his heart formed with the right chamber being to small to support his life. After he was born he had non-surgical procedure to put what is called a PDA stent in to support blood flow of his heart. He was hospitalized in the NICU for 11 days after birth.

After two months, he was rushed to the ER due to an arrhythmia staying 5 days in the hospital. Then 11 days later he went to the cardiologist for a routine checkup. Then Rainn was admitted and given an emergency procedure. This procedure was a larger stent placement to keep his PDA valve open until his scheduled open heart surgery.

At 4 months of his life he had heart surgery called Bidirectional Glenn. Then will need another surgery called Fontan at age four. Yes, that is 2 heart surgeries by age four.

His first surgery route was dark and scary. While recovering he picked up a cold (rhinovirus) that almost killed him. He then got an infection from an IV line that created fluid around his heart, causing him to need a tube to drain it. There where many other miss steps along the way but he is happy and recovering beautifully. Rainn was hospitalized for 70 days off and on throughout 2020. He faces a few development challenges but is taking therapy a few times per week to catch up.