WESTVILLE — A Westville girl is steadily getting used to a new part this week.

Kaitlyn Foster, a sixth-grader at Judith Giacoma Elementary School, received the gift her family has been praying for since March — a new heart.

The long-awaited transplant took place Tuesday, and so far, everything is going well. She went in for the transplant at 5:07 a.m. and she got out of surgery at 1:45 p.m.

Thursday, Kaitlyn was taken off a ventilator.

She has been at Chicago’s Children’s Memorial Hospital, and her family — dad Lonnie, mother Carmen, older sister Kacie and younger brother Logan — has been staying in Chicago’s Ronald McDonald house since March.

Kaitlyn was put on the transplant list March 18, when complications from her cardiomyopathy — a disorder that causes the heart to become abnormally enlarged — became very severe.

“It’s a wonderful feeling. We feel blessed,” Carmen said Thursday afternoon.

Kaitlyn has been on and off transplant waiting lists for years. She was put on the first one when she was an infant, but was later taken off when her heart seemed to recover.

Her heart disorder, which doctors believe may have been caused by a heart attack during her first week of life, worsened this spring. Despite four open-heart surgeries, repairs of her heart mitral valve, a mitral valve replacement and the insertion of a pacemaker, things took a turn for the worse in March.

A doctor’s visit to Peoria that month revealed that her pacemaker battery wasn’t working. She ended up at Children’s Memorial Hospital soon after, when tests showed she was too ill to remain at home.

She was placed on high-priority status for a transplant.

Agonizing wait

The time that elapsed between being placed on the list and the surgery was almost four months, and every day was an agonizing wait.

“It felt like a very, very long time. She was very sick toward the end and her heart was really failing,” Carmen said.

Kaitlyn was staying in the intensive care unit when the family got the official word Sunday that the surgery would be a go for the next day.

Thursday, after she was taken off the ventilator, Kaitlyn was aware of her surroundings and knew what was happening. She was partially sedated, but was awake enough to ask for things, Carmen said.

“She’s pretty alert. She knows what happened,” she said.

After she’s a bit more recovered, she’ll begin rehabilitation and some physical therapy.

Carmen admits she’s a little scared about the next step.

“We’re not sure how long it will take for her to come home. We’ll just have to wait and see,” she said.

Kaitlyn, though, is a fighter. She’s already got some plans for a few months from now.

“She wants to go to the Mall of America and take all of her friends,” Carmen said.

But the doctors say it will be about six months before she’ll be physically up to such a task. Kaitlyn turns 13 in October.

Those in the girl’s inner circle are excited for her, including her 5-year-old brother Logan.

“I think Logan was up all night that night,” Carmen said, remembering the evening they found out about the transplant.

“We found out at 6 p.m. on the sixth. When we told the family, he was crazy all night long. He stayed up until 3 or 4 a.m.,” she said.

Kaitlyn’s older sister, Kacie, 15, also is in her sister’s corner.

Vickie Smith, Kaitlyn’s aunt, said the family has remained strong because of all the support and prayers from home.

But Kaitlyn herself never gives up, she said.

A fighter

“She’s quite a fighter. You never consider that she might not make it. She’s had a rough time, but you can’t fathom that,” she said.

Kaitlyn has been able to keep up with her friends in school through a program at the hospital. A hospital teacher tutored her every day during the school year.

She goes to class with her classmates. Judith Giacoma School used a Skype program with a Web cam and microphone so she could participate in class.

Through it, Kaitlyn could see her classmates and they could see her on a projected screen in the class.

Giacoma Principal Melinda Pollock said Kaitlyn has been an inspiration for the other kids at her school.

“Katie’s a wonderful little girl. She’s one who has had a great many obstacles over the years, even when she started kindergarten. … Her stamina and her strength were never what they could have been, but she always tried to work her way through things,” Pollock said.

Pollock said Kaitlyn’s fellow students always ask about her. During the school’s honor assembly, many of the kids were more excited about communicating with her via Web came than their own awards.

Kaitlyn wrote notes of congratulations to the kids who were winning awards.

The kids at her school are learning valuable lessons because of her.

“Putting someone else first — that’s something that parents and schools try to teach children,” Pollock said.

“They truly are more concerned about her — if she’s doing all right. They really rallied around her. I’m proud of them.”

Commercial-News correspondent April Evans contributed to this report.