The "Diagnosis"

Two and a half weeks after we came home from the hospital...
I was just doing some chores around the house and Gabe was taking a nap in his swing and I get a phone call. It was a nurse from his pediatrician. She asked for Gabriel's parent and I said 'this is her' and she began to tell me his genetic newborn screening (blood test) they did at the hospital came back abnormal. My heart just drops... I start feeling faint. And I ask what was wrong and she says he tested positive for Cystic Fibrosis. My heart drops even lower. I start to cry, and I don't even know what Cystic Fibrosis is. I ask her about it and she says she's not allowed to talk about that over the phone that I have to see a doctor. So I am balling at this point. I call my mom to ask her if she knows what CF is, and she said she's not sure, so I ask her to go to the library and find out for me (we didn't have internet at this point). Robert is working but I call him anyways because I am so upset. He rushes home on his bicycle, comes in and hugs me. I tell him more about what the nurse said and then my mom shows up. We all sit down and talk and then begin to pray over Gabriel. I decide to just pick up and head to the doc, that was so unethicle to tell someone that about their child and tell you what it is or whats happening or going to happen. So I demand to see the doctor and he sits down with me, Robert and my mom and tells us that CF can test positive even if he is just a carrier and to not be worried yet that we will proceed to more testing. A carrier means that either just Robert or just me has a CF gene. Being a carrier does not effect you in any way. In order for someone to actually have CF the mother and the father must both carry the CF gene. CF is very rare, they say. Only 30,000 some odd people in america have it. CF effects a persons sweat chroride channels. Anyways, about a week later we take him to Tucson to get a sweat test, this tests the salt content in someones sweat, and if its abnormally high it usually means someone has CF. Near the end of the day the results shouldve been back, and the docs nurse keeps blowing me off and says she cant tell me the results over the phone. At this point I'm worried so I drive to the doc office 5 mins before they are supposed to close and ask to speak to the doc and they say hes already left and I tell them I just want to know the results please. So the nurse went back to find the doc and he hadn't left yet and he said that he'd sit down with me. His sweat results were high. Which meant positive for CF. We also did one more genetic screening which also tested positive. I have had 100% faith that my son will have a miracle, I will never stop believing God's promise to me and my family. I do not want pity, and do not pity my son. If you don't have something positive to say then don't say anything. Don't ever say "poor baby" to or about my son; he is not poor, he is healthy and strong. Our words are powerful!


For more information on Cystic Fibrosis and ways to contribute please visit: www.cff.org

I found it!

So yesterday I was watching an older episode of Jon and Kate plus 8 on TV, and they were buying presents for kids at St. Jude hospital, and then visiting them and giving them encouraging words and lifting their spirits. After watching that I was so moved by it! I told God that is what I want to do! That is my purpose! I want to go to hospitals and pray for kids and lift their spirits! Give them faith and hope! Awesome! I cannot wait!

My Son's Birth

Ok so I should have been blogging all of this since my son, Gabriel, was born but I haven't had time, and you'll see why!
April 25th, 2pm, I started going into labor. I got in the car and drove to my husband's work to tell him. Later that evening I started getting everything ready to go to the hospital. This was it! At around 9pm we drove to the hospital for them to tell me I'm only 1cm and to go home that it wasn't active labor. (I knew I was in active labor though, that's why I went!) So we went home, at this point it's 11pm already, we tried to get some sleep because I knew he'd be born soon. My contractions just kept getting worse and worse. I couldn't and didn't sleep at all. And I kept waking Robert up to massage me or hold my hair while I was throwing up.. The pain was bad. By 3am or so I had enough, it was terrible and I knew I was in active labor so we packed up again and went back to the hospital. They checked me again and I was now about 2 and a half cm. They said I could stay and it was active labor.  So they took me to my room, started an IV, and hooked me up to all those machines. By around 5am I was asking for drugs, I tried the IV meds and those did nothing except make me feel paralyzed. After that wore off, I got an epidural. As most of you know, I wanted to do natural birth, but I was in labor for almost 24 hours, I needed some sleep to be able to push well. The epidural went well, I couldn't feel anything from my chest down after that, and your stuck in bed. Time went by, we napped. I was woken by a nurse, they were concerned about my baby's heartbeat, is kept dropping. Scary. Very scary. I tried all the different positions, and nothing worked really. Every contraction his heart rate would drop again. Around noon they checked me and I was only about 7cm. They told me I would most likely need a c-sectioin. I was devastated. They started filling all the paperwork out for it, and brought scrubs in for Robert. The doctor came in to tell me more about the c-section and why we needed it. I was crying. The doc left for a few minutes while the nurses prepared. My Mom and Robert gathered around me and we all prayed deeply that God would intervean, I cried out to Him with everything I had, I did not want surgery. The doc came back, and I begged her to check me just one more time. She told me it's kind of impossible for it to have changed much but said she'd check anyway. She lifted my gown and began to check, watching her facial expressions, she suddenly seemed surprised and asked me to push once. I pushed and she said let's start pushing, you've dialated 2 more cm's! I was so shocked, all I could do the whole time I was pushing is thank God over and over! 40 minutes later, at 1:47pm, my son Gabriel Isaac was born!! God is so amazing!! The doctor and nurses were utterly in awe! And so were we! Because my son was born so quickly, they had to take him to the nursery right away, he wasn't crying enough or something. They hooked him up to oxygen. I didn't get to hold him until 11pm that night. It was hard but that's ok. He had a little hole in his lung from delivering quickly. The doc said it's normal and he just needed oxygen for it to heal up. We got to leave the hospital 2 days later. My son was perfect :)