Anarazell...Day 5

As promised...Here are some pictures of our beautiful Anarazell Joy.

Here we get to hold her for the first time.

Here is a close up. Lots of hair and a tiny nose!

The brace is holding the respirator still. If you can see past that, she is a pretty cute kid!

Here is Jen's hand in comparison to Anarazell's. And Jen has tiny hands! Anarazell's measured at 6 cm long.

Update..Day 4

Anarazell Joy turns 4 days old today...I feel like I have lived a lifetime, or several since Friday. I don't think the mind is supposed to go through so many emotions so fast.
We go to school with a couple whose family lives here in Waukesha and they have opened their house up to us indefinitly. Pretty awesome. In fact some people were talking to them about trying to find other arrangments for us, and this couple, Tom and Grace, said, "No, they are staying with us...for as many years as they need to." So we will be here for awhile. It is amazing how God has worked in so short of time, and how the Christian body has wrapped us in love...and food.
Do we have the food!!! Such a blessing.
Tom and Grace have loaned us their cell phone for the duration as well. The only time we won't have it on is when we are in the NICU with our baby. Feel free to call us. We might not be able to talk for too long, and depending on what part of the day you catch us, you might have to listen to some tears as well, but we would love to hear from people. 619-929-4591 And please call. None of this, "I didn't want to bother you..."
If you want our address, you can e-mail me, but I don't want to post that on the web like this...since it isn't even our house and all...
We had a pretty discouraging day today. You can really pray for us. They were trying to feed her with a stomach tube, but she isn't digesting the milk. They are trying to get her off the breathing machine, and have her breath on her own...so they turned the machine down to 10 breathes per minute, but then her co2 shot through the roof. Pretty much sugesting that she isn't breathing on her own at all...
When she was first admitted, she was breathing on her own, but having alot of seizures so they pumped her full of medication to stop those. Well, in doing so, she stopped breathing as well. So as they wait for the medication to leave her body they are hoping, and we are praying, that her breathing startes up again, but the seizures don't.
Her MRI and CAT scans show that her brain is underdeveloped. It looks like, and reads like a baby that is only 28 weeks in the womb.
So is she not breathing, swallowing, digesting because the medication has her so tired or because her brain is small? Will, she grow out of it in time? Will her brain grow from here on? All questions that we are asking, but no one knows the answers. Well, no one here on earth. God does.
Had a meeting today with the doctors and one again tomorrow, just to keep lines of communication open.

Thought that went through our heads today:
We now hate the smell of hospitals. But we love them, because they are the only smells that we have to associate with our baby.

I plan on posting some pictures tomorrow...

Un-titleable...

This is for everyone who we haven't called yet. Things have happened so incredably fast that we have hardly had time to breathe let alone contact everyone that we know. We will try to slowly get in-touch with people as time will allow.

Jen, Isabella and I came up here to Waukesha, Wisconsin, late on Wednesday the 23rd. (Well, we actually got in on Thanksgiving morning.) We enjoyed a day of friends and food and went to bed getting ready for Friday when we were going to be meeting our Mid-wife for the first time...
Friday, Jen woke up with harder contractions then she had been used to and we joked that, "Today was the day..."
Our baby is due on Christmas Eve.
We met with the Mid-wife (Deb) at 11 A.M. and around Noon she checks Jen and tells us that Jen is at 8cm and we aren't going to drive anywhere...we will have the baby in her house in just a few hours.
Emotions just went from normal to complete and total shock...
So, we called our two lady friends in the area and told them that they need to get here...about 5 minutes ago...if they want to be at the birth. We called our parents and told them that the next Grand-baby is on the way...to let everyone know and start praying.
Then we settled down for the wait...
The shock wears off as we start getting excited about what is happening and we start thinking a *bit* more seriously about names. We thought that we had 30 more days before this particular desision had to be made.
The labor went great. It was snowing outside and Jen absolutely loves snow. We turn on some Christmas music and just start having a good time. Jen would be in the middle of a contraction and someone whould crack a joke and she would laugh and lose concentration and have to wait 'till the next one to get back in the groove.
Emotions are now calm and relaxed.
Around 6 Deb asked if she could break the "water sack" and then things started to happen fast.
When the water broke, Deb realized that something was wrong...and told her assistant, Christi, to get the oxygen ready and really started getting Jen to push. She checked the babies heartbeat and it was great so we calmed Jen down and got her to consentrate.
Emotions are now bordering on terrified.
The baby's head came out fine and when the shoulders came out the mid-wife grabbed her and pulled her out...yelling out to call 911 and said that the baby was cold and not moving.
Jen and I "knew" that she was dead.
Emotions are off the chart...somewhere between terrified and heart-broke.
I am wispering in Jen's ear and praying like mad. One of our friends, Julie, was on Jen's other side doing the same thing. Christi was crying and forcing oxygen into our babies lungs. Deb was wrapping warm blankets around our tiny daughter and rubbing her. Our other friend, Kathy, was calling 911 and trying to figure out our address. I don't know why, but I was wispering my prayers. I was in shock...I don't know, but the next thing I know I hear Kathy over all the noise crying out to our God to save the life of this little baby. I will never forget her voice interceeding for my daughter, and I probably never be able to think about it without crying...
I then see a foot move, and we are told the the heart beat is up from 60 to 100 bpm...good enough for now.
The rest of the night is a blur. I get to carry my daughter, (whom we have since named Anarazell) to the hospital in the back of an ambulance. Jen is in a different one going to an ajoining hospital. Isabella is at Julie's house where she has been all day.
Emotions are now on overload...and pretty much shut down.
We are now in a waiting game.
Jen is out of the hospital and we are living in Waukesha, WI. with the parents of good friends.
Isabella goes to childcare with Julie in the morning, and goes home with her for lunch and her nap.
Anarazell is in the Neo-natal Intensive Care Unit at Childrens Hospital of Wisconsin. So far all we know so far is that her brain didn't develope correctly in the womb and it is small for her size. What does this mean...we don't know. To what extent will she be affected...we don't know. Do we love our daughter with every breath in our body...yes...that is all we know for sure right now.
Jen and I spend the morning with Anarazell who we need to be with, and then the afternoon with Isabella who needs us to be with her.
I am planing to update this every other day...
I will post pics of us and the girls. I will tell you how we are doing on any given day, and how you can pray for us. When we get settled I will give you our "permanent" phone number and address.
I will also start telling the story of how we've seen God's fingerprints all over. I will post those on the days that I am not talking about our family.
Emotions now vary...God is in control...we miss our daughter...life is hard, but it goes on.

Snug as a Bug...

Here is Isabella all ready for sleep. She is learning about caterpillers and butterflies, and so she likes to get wrapped up in her "cocoon" and wake up a beautiful butter-fly.

Jen has got it bad...

This was Jen's pumpkin for the festival we went to the other night. You could say that she was thinking alot about babies lately. She won an award for it. Most humorous...or something like that! Go Jen...

P.S. That is a "binki" in the baby's mouth...