Exceeding Abundantly

   

   Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end.                                                                    

                                                                                    Ephesians 3:20-21

    "Above all that we ask or think" 

  

    My dad reminded me of these words this week as Aaron has been going through open heart surgery. 

    On Friday Aaron was taken for his first open heart surgery. The Norwood Procedure it's called. You all know that the days and months before now we have been asking for your prayers as we prepared for that day, but I didn't know just how greatly God was going to answer those prayers. I had an unexplainable peace that I know came directly from our great God. He has been so good through all of this. Aaron came out of surgery great, the surgeon left his chest open because there was some extra bleeding. This is not uncommon and happens frequently with the type of surgery Aaron had. So we went down for a late lunch because we were told it would be an hour or so until we would be able to see him in his room. When we got back to the waiting room our nurse came to find us. There was even more bleeding than they thought. they had to go back in and try to figure out the problem. This took another few hours. Praise the Lord that they had kept his chest open! We finally got to go and see him around 6pm. Oh the difference that day made. Our sweet boy, who had looked completely perfect that morning when I placed him in his bed, now was full of tubes and wires and I could see right into his chest cavity. When they say they keep the chest open, it is OPEN. We actually watched our baby's heart beating inside his chest. And it was incredible. God has created us so intricately. And the fact that our surgeon knew how to deal with such a little heart is amazing. 

   Saturday morning we came in and the surgeon was there waiting for his OR team. They were going to close his chest! Awesome news, because that means they were no longer worried about the bleeding or fluids. And it was one step closer to him healing! A few hours later and our baby looked a little more like our baby. He has a nice big bandaid over his incision now. The next step after getting the chest closed was getting the chest tubes out and getting him off the breathing tubes, too. The breathing tubes can come out once he proves that he can breath on his own. And the chest tubes come out when there is no more bleeding or fluids coming out. Saturday night during rounds the Critical Care Attending wanted to see him breath on his own so he turned the ventilator way down...and he breathed! Talk about exciting! So they turned it back up, but not al the way to where it was and he was taking a few of his own breaths each minute. Well on his way to breathing on his own! After rounds the Attending said just how well Aaron was doing after just having surgery the day before. His nurses keep saying it too.

    Sunday morning we came in and right away I noticed something looked different but I couldn't quite see what it was. Our nurse said, "Well, do you notice anything different?" Chris right away said, "Oh, the chest tubes are out" Yay! Chest tubes are out! Such a big step! We were pretty excited. He has been pretty sleepy still today, and they are wanting him to wake up a little more so that he will breath more on his own and they can see if they can take that ventilator out. Tomorrow would be the earliest. Again all day we were told just how awesome Aaron is doing this soon post surgery. 

    This is where dad reminded me of that verse above. 

    I have such a hard time just rejoicing in all that God has done. God has been so good. One thing after another He has been showing us that He is doing "exceeding abundantly above all we can ask or think" And I am sitting here just waiting for something to go wrong. His heart to not work. His breathing to stop. But God is good! He's hearing all the hundreds of prayers that you all are praying for our precious boy. Aaron is completely in God's hands and there is nothing that can change that. He is such an amazing boy and I cannot wait to see what God is going to do with his life. All I know is it will be better than I could ever dream for his life. God has been doing more than we can ask or think. God is good and His faithfulness is never ending! 

 

He's Here!

We have welcomed our third baby boy into the world!

Late on Saturday evening I went into labor and early on Easter morning he was born! There were so many answers to prayers in those hours, I just have to give God the glory!

We had moved into our new home at the Ronald McDonald house Saturday afternoon (blessing number 1). We had initially been told that we would not be able to move in until I was discharged from the hospital, but got a call last week that they had a room for us! That night is when I went into labor. So thankful that we were able to move in when we did, we got to just walk over to the hospital when I wasn't sure if the labor was real or not. I was not expecting to be giving birth that night. I was scheduled to be induced Monday morning. So Chris and I walked over just in case. And hour after I was there our nurse decided that this was the real thing and we weren't going anywhere!

Blessing number 2 came in that I had texted a friend about possibly needing someone to stay the night with my sleeping boys while my mom came over for the birth! I was about to tell her that we didn't need her, but thankfully I took her up on the offer and she was on her way (It was 10 min later that I was told we weren't leaving the hospital)! Labor went quickly after that and around 1am Sunday morning Aaron Ezekiel was born! If you didn't know about his heart, you wouldn't think anything is wrong with him. He is just perfect in every other way.

Blessing number 3 came right when he was born. I vaguely remember the Doctor who delivered him saying, "Wow, he has a true knot in his chord". And all I remember thinking was, "Wait, babies can die in-utero from a knot in their chords". She then told me to look and sure enough, his umbilical chord had a complete knot in it. Brings me to tears just thinking about how God protected Aaron even while he was still in me. God has great plans for this little boys life! I cannot wait to continue to watch and see those plans! I was able to hold him for just a few brief (but wonderful!) moments before they took him to the NICU. Chris went with Aaron and thankfully I had my mom to stick with me. A while later we were able to go down to the NICU to see him as the cardiologist was doing his first ECHO. We are so thankful for technology! Thankfully there were no surprises in that ECHO and things look very much like they did while he was growing. The Doctors have been such a help already.

Aaron is doing very well. He is now 3 days old and I got to give him his first bottle today! That made my Momma heart SO happy. For those who have had babies or older kids go through surgeries or the like, you know. It is so hard seeing your little one hooked up to so many machines. So hard not to be able to just pick him up whenever I want. SO hard not to just feed him when I think he needs to be fed. We are blessed that we will have this week to hold and feed and snuggle him before he goes in for his first surgery. He is scheduled for first thing Friday morning.

Pray that we would be able to use this time to love on our boy while still loving our other two! So thankful that my parents are both here and my sister too! We have such an amazing support system, I don't even know where to start in saying thank you to everyone.

God has just been so good, even when we didn't know He was working, He always was! And although these next weeks and months are not going to be easy, I know He will still be working, even when I don't see it or don't believe it. Thank you for your love and support!!

To GOD be the glory!