After Caleb, our third child, was born we were told it would be very dangerous for us to have any more children. We were devastated. We went home and cried and laid it before the Lord. We knew we wanted more than three, and that desire comes from Him, so we asked Him what to do about it. Were we supposed to adopt? He asked us to wait.
Waiting on the Lord. I hear that phrase often used among Christians and I must confess that I have been guilty of using it rather lightly, at times. It is a very serious choice to commit to wait before the Lord. I, in all my wisdom (excuse me-I started choking), want to "influence" the Lord to see things the "right" way. Definition: my way. That attitude or posture of my spirit has NOTHING to do with waiting on the Lord. The arrogance of my heart knows no bounds. Can you imagine: Me tell Him how things should go??
"Search me, O God, and
know my heart;
test me and know my
anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive
way in me,
and lead me in the way
everlasting.
Psalm 139:23, 24 (NIV)
know my heart;
test me and know my
anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive
way in me,
and lead me in the way
everlasting.
Psalm 139:23, 24 (NIV)
In His most loving Mercy, He had us wait. For several years, we waited. Precious years to enjoy the three wonderful incarnations of His Love He had already entrusted to us. Still the longing for more children would surface.
One day, I was sitting at the desk in our kitchen working on something. Mackenzy was eight years old. She came up to me and told me that she had had a dream. Well, there's a way Mackenzy says, "I had a dream", that means the typical thing it does for most of us. Then there's the other way she says it that means much more. She is blessed of the Lord to be very sensitive to promptings of the Spirit. When she said it this time, I knew this wasn't the normal retelling of a dream. She told me that the Lord had told her that we were going to have another baby. The baby would be a girl, and we were to name her Elizabeth. In all my wisdom, I said, "That's nice, honey, go play." Typical me. What does He have to do? Hit me over the head with a baseball bat??
Well, Kregg and I decided that we should at least go and talk to the doctor to see if anything new had been learned about our condition in the intervening years. An explanation would seem helpful here. During Caleb's delivery, something happened. The doctor said we will never know how this happened, but some of Caleb's blood got into my bloodstream. Everyone has a unique chemical composition to their blood and when two are mixed, funny things happen. Genetically, he had some things that I didn't. No problem separately, but when combined, my blood reacted by producing negative antibodies to "protect" itself from unknown invaders. It has basically the same effect as the Rh factor in pregnancies. Major difference is this condition is not treatable. If a later baby had some of the antigens that I had reacted to, my blood would try to destroy the blood of the baby. Intervention is the only option if the baby gets in trouble. The two options for intervention are: in utero transfusions of the baby performed about every three weeks to keep its blood at a level sufficient for it to continue developing, and then if we could get to 27 weeks in the pregnancy, they would deliver the baby because the prematurity was less of a risk than the transfusions. They don't even perform these transfusions in west Texas. We would have had to travel to Houston or Dallas for each one. Well, that scenario was pretty terrifying. I remember the doctor saying, "It's not ALWAYS fatal." This doctor was new to the area since Caleb had been born. He was a specialist in high risk pregnancies.
" . . . for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him." Matthew 6:6-7.
Kregg and I left his office, went out to the van and just sat in the parking lot. What do we do? As if we could do anything. Besides, He had already done it. We had no idea, but we were already expecting!!! We didn't have to "decide" anything. We just had to wait before a Sovereign Father God.
After finding out we were expecting, we learned it was, of course, a little girl. Do you know what the name Elizabeth means? Consecrated to God.
The pregnancy was scary, even with the Faithfulness He had already shown. They had to monitor her carefully, so every doctor visit required blood work to measure how she was doing. The titer numbers would bump up against the "ceiling", at which point they perform an amnio to get a more exact measurement before determining what to do, but they never got above that first "ceiling". We made it all the way to full term! We thought we were in the clear, because the incompatibility problem was only during the pregnancy. After delivery, no more incompatibility.
When she was born, everything initially looked perfect. They took her to clean her up after our time together. Kregg left to coach Hannah's basketball game at the Y and was going to be back shortly. Before they brought her back, our pediatrician came in to see me. Something was wrong. She told me she just sensed it, so she ordered a complete blood work-up. She explained to us that Elizabeth had become very jaundiced very quickly and the blood work revealed a problem. She had already called in a pediatric hemotologist (who just happened to be here at a satellite clinic of a big children's hospital in Ft. Worth. He left not long after Elizabeth was born. )
" . . . for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him."
When he came to see me, he had already examined her, moved her into an isolation room by herself, started photo therapy, and was requiring everyone to wear gloves, masks, and gowns to enter the room. He explained to me that there had apparently been other antibodies present that had gone undetected. She had no neutrophils, the kind of blood cell that fights off bacterial infection. There were two possible scenarios: her body was unable make them (like the "bubble-boy" who had to live inside a germ free bubble, until he eventually contracted an infection and died), or her body was making them and my body had been destroying them. If her body couldn't make the blood cells, they could try a bone marrow transplant. Otherwise, it would certainly be fatal. If her body could make them, then we had to keep her from contracting an infection for long enough to allow her blood to "catch up".
He told me he wanted her out of the hospital as soon as possible. We would have to set up an isolation room at our house with no visitors, even our other children. Nurses would come each day and draw blood. She would require a portable light therapy machine to treat the jaundice. We would only be able to tell which scenario we were dealing with, if the neutrophils started showing up in the blood tests. I was in shock. I asked him to please stay until Kregg came back and explain it to him. There was certainly no way I could.
We called friends and family to pray. Many of our friends came to my room and bathed us in prayer. They went to our house and cleaned our bedroom so it could be used for isolation. And they prayed. They took our other three children and fed them. And they prayed. They fixed meals, they mowed our yard, they gave us an impromptu "Welcome Home Elizabeth" party complete with cake and balloons. They came to our bedroom door that looks out on the patio and used it like a viewing window to see her. And they PRAYED.
The hematologist told us that if her body could make the neutrophils, it normally took 2 to 3 months to "catch up". I was wondering how on earth I was going to be able to stay shut up in my bedroom with Elizabeth, and still be able to take care of the other three children for that long.
Within two and a half weeks she was released from treatment! Completely healthy with no residual effects! Consecrated to God: our precious Elizabeth. A miracle in every sense of the word.
He is Sufficient for what concerns me today!! This day, this hour, this minute, this breath. I should never doubt again!! But, of course, I am me. So the lessons continue . . .
One day, I was sitting at the desk in our kitchen working on something. Mackenzy was eight years old. She came up to me and told me that she had had a dream. Well, there's a way Mackenzy says, "I had a dream", that means the typical thing it does for most of us. Then there's the other way she says it that means much more. She is blessed of the Lord to be very sensitive to promptings of the Spirit. When she said it this time, I knew this wasn't the normal retelling of a dream. She told me that the Lord had told her that we were going to have another baby. The baby would be a girl, and we were to name her Elizabeth. In all my wisdom, I said, "That's nice, honey, go play." Typical me. What does He have to do? Hit me over the head with a baseball bat??
Well, Kregg and I decided that we should at least go and talk to the doctor to see if anything new had been learned about our condition in the intervening years. An explanation would seem helpful here. During Caleb's delivery, something happened. The doctor said we will never know how this happened, but some of Caleb's blood got into my bloodstream. Everyone has a unique chemical composition to their blood and when two are mixed, funny things happen. Genetically, he had some things that I didn't. No problem separately, but when combined, my blood reacted by producing negative antibodies to "protect" itself from unknown invaders. It has basically the same effect as the Rh factor in pregnancies. Major difference is this condition is not treatable. If a later baby had some of the antigens that I had reacted to, my blood would try to destroy the blood of the baby. Intervention is the only option if the baby gets in trouble. The two options for intervention are: in utero transfusions of the baby performed about every three weeks to keep its blood at a level sufficient for it to continue developing, and then if we could get to 27 weeks in the pregnancy, they would deliver the baby because the prematurity was less of a risk than the transfusions. They don't even perform these transfusions in west Texas. We would have had to travel to Houston or Dallas for each one. Well, that scenario was pretty terrifying. I remember the doctor saying, "It's not ALWAYS fatal." This doctor was new to the area since Caleb had been born. He was a specialist in high risk pregnancies.
" . . . for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him." Matthew 6:6-7.
Kregg and I left his office, went out to the van and just sat in the parking lot. What do we do? As if we could do anything. Besides, He had already done it. We had no idea, but we were already expecting!!! We didn't have to "decide" anything. We just had to wait before a Sovereign Father God.
After finding out we were expecting, we learned it was, of course, a little girl. Do you know what the name Elizabeth means? Consecrated to God.
The pregnancy was scary, even with the Faithfulness He had already shown. They had to monitor her carefully, so every doctor visit required blood work to measure how she was doing. The titer numbers would bump up against the "ceiling", at which point they perform an amnio to get a more exact measurement before determining what to do, but they never got above that first "ceiling". We made it all the way to full term! We thought we were in the clear, because the incompatibility problem was only during the pregnancy. After delivery, no more incompatibility.
When she was born, everything initially looked perfect. They took her to clean her up after our time together. Kregg left to coach Hannah's basketball game at the Y and was going to be back shortly. Before they brought her back, our pediatrician came in to see me. Something was wrong. She told me she just sensed it, so she ordered a complete blood work-up. She explained to us that Elizabeth had become very jaundiced very quickly and the blood work revealed a problem. She had already called in a pediatric hemotologist (who just happened to be here at a satellite clinic of a big children's hospital in Ft. Worth. He left not long after Elizabeth was born. )
" . . . for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him."
When he came to see me, he had already examined her, moved her into an isolation room by herself, started photo therapy, and was requiring everyone to wear gloves, masks, and gowns to enter the room. He explained to me that there had apparently been other antibodies present that had gone undetected. She had no neutrophils, the kind of blood cell that fights off bacterial infection. There were two possible scenarios: her body was unable make them (like the "bubble-boy" who had to live inside a germ free bubble, until he eventually contracted an infection and died), or her body was making them and my body had been destroying them. If her body couldn't make the blood cells, they could try a bone marrow transplant. Otherwise, it would certainly be fatal. If her body could make them, then we had to keep her from contracting an infection for long enough to allow her blood to "catch up".
He told me he wanted her out of the hospital as soon as possible. We would have to set up an isolation room at our house with no visitors, even our other children. Nurses would come each day and draw blood. She would require a portable light therapy machine to treat the jaundice. We would only be able to tell which scenario we were dealing with, if the neutrophils started showing up in the blood tests. I was in shock. I asked him to please stay until Kregg came back and explain it to him. There was certainly no way I could.
We called friends and family to pray. Many of our friends came to my room and bathed us in prayer. They went to our house and cleaned our bedroom so it could be used for isolation. And they prayed. They took our other three children and fed them. And they prayed. They fixed meals, they mowed our yard, they gave us an impromptu "Welcome Home Elizabeth" party complete with cake and balloons. They came to our bedroom door that looks out on the patio and used it like a viewing window to see her. And they PRAYED.
The hematologist told us that if her body could make the neutrophils, it normally took 2 to 3 months to "catch up". I was wondering how on earth I was going to be able to stay shut up in my bedroom with Elizabeth, and still be able to take care of the other three children for that long.
Within two and a half weeks she was released from treatment! Completely healthy with no residual effects! Consecrated to God: our precious Elizabeth. A miracle in every sense of the word.
He is Sufficient for what concerns me today!! This day, this hour, this minute, this breath. I should never doubt again!! But, of course, I am me. So the lessons continue . . .
A friend sent me the link to your blog! So encouraging! I am pregnant with my 7th baby and am the world's least likely candidate for being the mother of seven (and living in the "hood", but that's another story)! But isn't God into picking the least likely candidates who don't know what they're doing? Love your writing - keep blessing people!
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