Pictures from my time in the hospital.
Tonight, after tacos and cold diet cokes, G & I sat on our living room couch and bounced our baby. We had her on the edge of my knees, sitting up stiffly, bouncing up and down and back and forth as she laughed and screamed in delight. And we watched her with permanent smiles on our faces.
After we finished, she sat on her Dad's lap and then suddenly, began to fuss. After giving her her bink, rocking her for a bit and trying all of his Daddliest tricks, G lifted her slightly and discovered the problem. She'd had a blow-out. A massive one. And now his shirt, his shorts and her little outfit were all covered in baby pee.
He tried to solicit my help. "It's a blow-out!" he yelled. "I need back-up". So I came and watched, but didn't help. After all, I change blow-outs all the time. And really, he's got it.
He returned her to me after using most of the wipes in the warmer and proclaimed it to be the wettest, soggiest diaper he had ever seen (isn't this just a lovely post!?). And I had this thought, instantly, come into my head:
"This from the baby who didn't pee enough in her Mom's tummy".
And even as I said it, I surprised myself with how meaningful a little statement like that really was. How miraculous it was, really. Because now, that baby...she pees.
And she's that same baby. My baby. My baby that baffled doctors, that left them confused and uncertain. My baby that lived inside my stomach for months with little-to-no amniotic fluid (which is really just made up of baby urine, did you know?). My baby that so many Doctor's told me might be sick, might have problems, might not be well. My baby that landed me in the hospital on bed-rest for 6 weeks. My baby whose little heart we had to listen to every 3 hours. Whose NST's were scheduled twice per day.
And all because we needed to make sure there hadn't been a kink in her umbilical cord. Because she didn't have enough amniotic fluid to move. Because we needed to make sure she was still alive.
Because, my Doctor finally proclaimed in confusion, she simply didn't pee enough.
But oh, that baby, she pees now.
All the time, really.
And she laughs, she cries, she screams in delight. She grows, she changes, she learns.
And she's
fine.
Sometimes I look at her and feel overwhelmed with the knowledge that God loves us. That even when we think there isn't a reason to hope, there is. That situations change. That nothing is permanent. That bad times get better. That life goes on. And sometimes, people surprise us.
We have the blow-outs to prove it.