>>>>PLEASE DONATE VIA CONTINUE TO GIVE AT https://www.continuetogive.com/4859593 <<<<<

Hi, my name is Matt Logan, and I am 28 years old. I am a Corporate Maintenance Director for Cypress Skilled Nursing, which is a group of nursing homes here in Georgia. I met my now wife, Audrey Logan (27) when we rode the bus together in fifth grade, and I’ve loved her ever since. We were born and raised in the Acworth area, and live there currently. We always knew that we wanted a family more than anything, and tried shortly after getting married; it wasn’t in His timing just yet, as we have two sweet angel babies. After what seemed like forever, the Lord blessed us with our daughter, Peyton (now 1), on May 9, 2018.

That was the day our life would change forever, not just because we welcomed our daughter into the world, but also because this is the day my wife’s health took a drastic change. Let me catch you up a bit- when Audrey was 16, she had sudden cardiac arrest while playing softball, was diagnosed with CPVT (Catecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia) and had a defibrilator implanted. She has done seemingly well over the years, she had a few improper shocks, including once when dancing with me at Homecoming (yes that was a scary night to say the least!). Her pregnancy went extremely well until she reached 37 weeks, and started to have a very large amount of palpitations and was short of breath. That is a day I will never forget. We worked together in the nursing home, she was a Social Worker at Roswell Nursing and Rehab, but I was in a sister facility that day. When I received that call from her I knew something was wrong, she was so short of breath that she could hardly even speak to me. All I remember was praying for her, praying for my daughter, and praying that I could make it to her safely and quickly. After an ER visit, being admitted to the Cardiac Floor for observation, and after many medications and testing, her palpitations did not let up. They decided to welcome our daughter into the world that very next day.

After our daughter was born, the frequency of Audrey’s palpitations drastically decreased and she was talking and breathing like normal. We assumed that all was well, as the doctors seemed to agree that she looked better, and “back to normal”. It wasn’t until about two months later at her follow up visit with her long-time cardiologist, that we were informed “back to normal” was just not the case. During that hospital stay, the doctors preformed an Echocardiogram, which is an ultrasound of your heart that takes pictures of things like movement, size, and blood flow. Her echocardiogram showed that her ejection fracture was about 35%. An ejection fracture of 35 percent means that 35 percent of the total amount of blood in the left ventricle is pushed out with each heartbeat. Normal ejection fracture ranges from 55% to 70%. Her cardiologist thought this could have just been from the stress of the baby, and he was hopeful that it had already gone back to normal. However, that was not the case. We were told that my wife most likely had Peripartum Cardiomyopathy, PPCM, which is a form a heart failure due to pregnancy. The hope was that she could start a new medication regimen, and since she is young and otherwise healthy, her heart would improve. After months of doctors appointments, medication adjustments, and testing, her heart continued to worsen, and she continued to feel worse, her ejection fracture is now at about 20%. She was referred to evaluation by the heart transplant team.

I couldn’t even fathom what was happening, how is this happening? We finally have our daughter, all we have ever dreamed of, and here I am worrying if my wife will be here to watch her grow up, if I will be able to grow old with my wife. It was then that I held my wife, and cried, and prayed. We prayed for strength, guidance, and grace.

She has not been able to return to work, leaving the financial aspect on me. Due to the higher cost of insurance, we decided for my wife and daughter to be on their own insurance plan starting January 2019. We found out in late February that their insurance was dropped by her doctors, which made this process that much harder. She was referred to Emory transplant clinic for evaluation, however we quickly found out that they also no longer accepted her insurance. We had to be referred out of state for transplant evaluation. We have traveled back and forth to Vanderbilt in Nashville, TN three times now, and there will be many more trips to come. My wife was evaluated for heart transplant, and has been placed on the list, and is also a candidate for a LVAD (an implantable pucp to help until a transplant is available). Since she is fairly stable at the time, she could remain on the list for one to two years before receiving a heart, unless she takes a turn for the worse. The transplant team informed us that we need to start fundraising as soon as possible and that they recommend we raise as much as $10,000, since this journey will be so costly. This fund would help with travel and accommodations, the surgery, medications, follow up visits, etc. The toughest part will be having to stay in Nashville near the hospital for at least 6 weeks after surgery.

I know that no matter what, the Lord is faithful. He listens to our prayers and he never gives us more than we can handle. I pray daily for healing in my wife, however if that doesn’t happen, I pray that we can grow old together, and that she may watch our miracle baby grow up. I know that this whole situation has brought myself and my family closer to God. He has done so much work in our lives, and has showed us the impact our story has had on others. I have been blow away by the outpouring of love, support, and prayer that we have received from family, friends, and even acquaintances. I am extremely lucky, blessed, and grateful to be chosen as a recipient of the Helping One Guy Dinner for the month of August, and I look forward to getting my wife’s, my family’s, story out there.