Complete

I just wanted to fill you all in on some of the amazing details of the past few days. William and Philip and I are home and doing great. A new baby is such a joy, and of course, we think little William is perfect. A few pictures are attached – I’m sure there will be many more to come! Giving birth to William was the most amazing experience of my entire life. The experience, and William’s life so far, has helped me understand in a new way just how good our God is. He is faithful to answer prayers. He is great enough to be the author and sustainer of life. He always knows what he is doing – truly, His ways are higher than our ways, and his thoughts are higher than our thoughts. And, oh, how He must love his children! Here are a few details on how God has provided for our little family over the past few days.

My water broke at 2 am Friday morning, the very day of William’s due date. Philip and I headed to the hospital, me rejoicing that our baby was soon to arrive – and laughing that he was right on time! Although my water had broken, by 6 am, labor wasn’t progressing much on his own. They gave me Pitocin to speed up labor, and the Dr gave me my epidural shortly thereafter. Thanks to the epidural, labor seemed so fast, and I was able to enjoy it and keep up my strength (I strongly recommend that any woman having a baby give herself this gift). By 3:30 pm, I was ready to start pushing. So far, it had been a typical "textbook" labor according to my L&D nurse. William was delivered at 4:15 pm, a healthy baby boy weighing 7 pounds, 6 ounces, and measuring in at 21 inches long.

After William was delivered was when things got scary. I began having a lot of pain, as the Doctor and nurses kept ‘massaging’ (aka, pushing really hard on) my uterus. I noticed that they hadn’t brought William to me, but had sent him over to the little warmer in the corner of the room. I overheard someone comment that I was bleeding a lot and they needed to stop it. Very quickly, the room started buzzing and the number of people working on my went from 2 (Dr and Nurse) to 8. I was fully awake… and started getting scared when I heard phrases like “Do we need to get her an Operating room?” “may need a blood transfusion” “blood pressure is 60/40” and “may have to do an emergency hysterectomy.” I started getting really weak and just turned my focus on 1. Praying and 2. Breathing. The Doctors sent Philip out of the room to go with William to the nursery, and provide our families with an update. One of the people working on me (from anesthesiology) told Philip to kiss me goodbye before he left. That was an emotional moment for both of us. Philip

Our parents and friends in the waiting room immediately kicked into prayer mode – and I was at peace knowing that I would be covered in prayer. I was even told that one of the doctors prayed over me! The Doctors were able to find the source of the bleeding, and stop it. The situation stabilized, and despite a big scare, the loss of a lot of blood, and some extra soreness for the road ahead, I am completely fine. Praise God!

I think that my mom summed it all up with words better than I can:

So here's what I've learned:
1. A hospital like Tx. Women's in the Medical Center of Houston is awesome. Pregnancy, labor, delivery--none of it is routine. It may seem like it is these days, because it most often is, but as Lauren's L&D nurse said, "This is why no one should ever even consider having a baby at home."
2. The value of friends, family, friends of family, family of friends, friends of friends, and even complete strangers who will drop everything and pray is unbelievably powerful. Many of you texted messages to us like "2 prayer teams from 2 churches praying" and "praying non-stop" and "lifting L, P, W up in prayer." On July 17, 2009 we personally witnessed the power of prayer, as well as God's healing touch. There is no way we could have done this alone.

I will leave you with a moment from late the night of William's birth that I cannot thank God enough for and one I hope that may enable me to get a bit of rest, that of tears streaming down Lauren’s pale, exhausted face, her holding William, looking at her tired, tearful husband and saying, “Our little family is complete.”