Speaking of Easy

This past Monday was our quarterly heart clinic visit at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital — the same place where our daughter received her heart transplant when she was just five months old. We’ve been making the four-hour drive to Stanford regularly ever since. After all these years, the routine is familiar, and so are the emotions.

As a heart mom and a heart kid, these visits always come with a swirl of anxiety — the quiet worries, the what-ifs, the holding of breath. That’s why we make it a point to pair each trip with something special. A moment of joy. A small adventure. Something to balance out the heaviness with a little light.

This trip was no different.

Sunday Evening

For this trip, we decided to explore somewhere new to us — Pacifica, CA, just south of San Francisco. The town has gained a bit of TikTok fame for its beachfront Taco Bell Cantina, perched right on the sand with panoramic ocean views. Naturally, we had to check it out.

The place was PACKED! They have a bar inside that serves drinks in yard glasses. We skipped those and instead ordered some churros and a regular-sized fountain drink. We waited for our order out on the patio that overlooks the beach where there were a lot of surfers, dogs, and families.

I thought this Taco Bell was new, but Delish tells us it has been here since the 80s, but was remodeled last Summer. It also isn’t their first Cantina (where they serve alcohol), but it is their first “stand-alone” Cantina. Visiting a place we’d only seen on TikTok was fun in itself, but — like many viral spots — it turned out the fanfare was a little overstated.

Dinner and the Beach

We didn’t just eat Churros for dinner! We went to a local place that had great reviews and unlike the Taco Bell, this place did not disappoint. Luigi’s has a small storefront in a neighborhood strip mall, but don’t let that fool you. This place was delicious, welcoming and delicious.

Before dinner and Taco Bell, we walked from our hotel down to Rockaway Beach and watched the surfers. The coolness was a nice change from the 100+ temp we had left behind at home, but it was not swimming weather to be sure. We still had a good time and enjoyed the sun, sand and breeze.

Heart Clinic and Home

After all that beach time and pasta, we slept well — thankfully — because we had to be up early. The alarm went off at 6:00 a.m. so we could get to Lucile Packard by our 7:30 appointment. We made a quick stop for coffee in a beautiful Starbucks in Pacifica and then hit the road!

My daughter’s a total pro at these appointments now. Since last year, she’s been handling her echocardiograms solo, which leaves me with a solid stretch of waiting room time. This morning, I filled it with some much-needed Google Drive cleanup and half-watched Cars 2 on the lobby TV — a mix of digital decluttering and animated background noise while she was in with the techs.

This was a standard clinic day for us — a checklist we’ve memorized by now:

1. Echocardiogram
2. Meeting with the transplant team’s nurse practitioner (no fellows, doctors, or med students today)
3. Blood draw
4. Pacemaker check
5. EKG
6. Session with the team psychologist, focusing on building her self-care skills

All told, it wasn’t a long day — we were back on the road by 10:50 a.m. But even when everything runs on time, even when the news is good, these days are draining. They’re a far cry from how hard they were when my daughter was younger — scared, squirmy, overwhelmed — but they’re still exhausting in their own way.

Now, it’s mostly mental. The anticipation, the what-ifs, the weight of knowing how much rides on these check-ins. I think we all feel it, even if we don’t say it out loud.

Thankfully, the outcome was manageable — just a medication adjustment and a follow-up blood test in two weeks. All in all, not too bad.

As always, I’m deeply aware that every day with my daughter is a gift — one made possible by an anonymous donor sixteen years ago, nearly to the day (7/7/09). Her life is a profound reminder that someone else gave us this chance, and I don’t take a single moment of it for granted. I do my best to honor that gift, every day.