ULTRASOUND

“My oldest is going into sixth grade, too,” she said, “and he had this same test done last year.”

Eleven years ago, Van Pelt herself was a patient undergoing an ultrasound, which showed serious problems in her pregnancy with identical twin boys.

As a result, she and her husband, Ryan, suffered the death of one twin and dealt with a heart defect in the other.

Since then, surgeons at Children’s have repaired son Carter’s heart. Now 10 — he turns 11 on Wednesday — he is healthy but still undergoes periodic ultrasound checkups there.

The Van Pelts, who live in Galloway, had another son, Holden, in 2010 after an ultrasound offered reassurance that the baby was developing normally.

All those experiences, both good and bad, inspired Erin Van Pelt to pursue a career as a sonographer.

Two years ago, she gave up her bartending job to enter the diagnostic medical sonography program at Central Ohio Technical College in Newark.

When Van Pelt, 37, graduated last month, she had a job waiting for her at Children’s — the same place where her family has been on the other end of many ultrasounds.

“It’s surreal,” she said. “It still hasn’t even fully sunk Ryan and Erin Van Pelt, with sons Carter, 10, and Holden, 7 in that I go there for my job now. Ultrasound has come full circle in my life.”

The former Erin Schimmoeller grew up in Lima and met Ryan Van Pelt in 2002 while both attended Bowling Green State University, and the couple were married in 2004.

Early in 2007, they learned that Erin was pregnant with twins. About three months into the pregnancy, she was undergoing an ultrasound when her obstetrician shared devastating news.

“He was looking at the screen with his poker face — which I have now (in her job) — and he stopped and put his hand on my arm and said, `I’m going to start talking to you now,” she recalled.

The twins weren't sharing the placenta equally. One was getting too many nutrients, and the other not enough.

“It was a blast of reality and a very sobering moment,” Ryan Van Pelt said.

Surgeons created two placentas, but one twin died the

next day. Later, ultrasounds found that the surviving baby had pulmonary stenosis, a condition in which the pulmonary valve barely opens.

Carter Van Pelt was born July 11, 2007, and had successful heart surgery two days later.

Early in 2010, when Erin was again pregnant, she nervously underwent a fetal echocardiogram to check the baby’s heart. It was fine.

“At that point," she said, "everybody took a deep breath."

Holden was born in September 2010.

In the ensuing years, the idea of becoming a sonographer began to form in her mind.

“I like helping people, and all those technical things, the things you can see inside someone’s body, are just amazing,” Erin said.

She waited to act on her idea, working as a server and bartender until her husband had finished his master’s degree and begun work as a counselor. She excelled academically and clinically

at Central Ohio Technical College, graduating with honors.

“Erin was one of the hardest-working students we had,” said Melinda Shoen, director of the sonography program. “If she missed a question on a test, we checked the test.”

Van Pelt did a clinical rotation at Children’s starting in January, and her supervisors liked her enough to have her come back for a second rotation in the spring before offering her the fulltime job.

“Erin stood out because she seemed to take the education and apply it, and it stuck,” said Bernadette Richards, technical director of the echocardiography lab at Children’s. “She’s very bright and calm and patient with children. She just really gets it.”

Shoen said it's common for people to do what Erin did: go into sonography as a second career because of their life experiences.

Eventually, Van Pelt said, she might undergo additional training and become certified to perform prenatal echocardiograms. For now, she enjoys working in a field that has been so meaningful to her family.

“For her, it went from trauma with everything that happened, to an acceptance, and then a realization that she can do this (for a career) and can help others,” Ryan Van Pelt said. “It has been huge for her to be able to do that.”