Many parents of 6-month-olds are grateful for a little quiet time.
But Eman Sulimin may be more grateful than most.
Her daughter, Zainab Al Hussien, was born with a hole in her heart and breathed loudly, with a loud raspy rattle, for most of her life. Her constant labored breathing was just one sign the baby's health was extremely fragile. Another was her color -- Zainab often turned almost blue because her heart problems kept oxygen from circulating properly.
Doctors in Syria couldn't offer much help, so Sulimin and her husband looked for help 7,100 miles away from their home in Damascus, to the group Heart Gift.
Heart Gift is an Austin-based non-profit foundation that brings children from mostly underdeveloped countries to Austin and other cities for life-changing heart surgery. The foundation tries to choose children whose problems can be repaired during a single visit to the United States.
Zainab underwent delicate heart surgery in early November, and her labored breathing is now almost gone. She is scheduled to undergo one more medical procedure before returning to Syria in late December.
"I'm so thankful that God saved my daughter's life and this is why I'm celebrating Thanksgiving," Sulimin says through her translator, Maya Hinedi. "Even in Syria now, my family, my husband and all my friends, are celebrating Thanksgiving for that reason.
"Now I'm thinking of what can I do to pay back this country for their country and gentleness and theri favor, because they saved my life and my daughter's life."
Hinedi and her family hosted Sulimin and her daughter for their months-long visit to the U.S.
Hinedi, a native of Syria, says she's grateful this Thanksgiving for not just Zainab's improving health, but also for the generosity from Americans that made the surgery possible.
"I'm thankful that there are people and organizations that look beyond religions and nationality and ethnicity and reach out and help people in need," Hinedi says. "This is the gentle and the human side of America that I want the world to see.
"Syria and the Middle East don't get to see that side often," she says. "They see sanctions and vetoes and wars, but I'm glad and I'm happy and I'm thankful for HeartGift."
Dr. Kenneth Fox, a pediatric heart surgeon, says Zainab's prognosis is much better now that she's had surgery and the hole in her heart is repaired.
"She still makes some noise (breathing), but I expect that will improve with time," he says.
Her life "will be very close to normal," he says. "She will have to go back and see doctors much more often than most other children, and there is a ch acne that at some point in the future we might need to do something else, like work on the arteries going out to the lungs, whether that's in a cath lab or in an operating room, but whether that can done at home or whether she will have to come back to see us we have to figure out."
To find out more about HeartGift, go to heartgift.org.
She has some lingering health problems, but he says with proper care she should be able to lead a healthy life
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