In the beginning

I'll just give you the highlights of the beginning our journey...starting at "we want kids".

I wasn't sure I'd be able to have children...endometriosis.  After nearly three years of marriage, I felt we were ready and my window was closing.  As soon as we started trying, we were blessed with Samuel almost immediately.  No fertility issues here :)  Glory to God.  

It was a smooth pregnancy.  Only one major scare at the end of the 1st trimester at 2am, I bled like I was dying.  But all was well.  That was a hard night.  God was teaching us to trust Him.  Not always easy.

Mommy & Samuel 2009

Memaw & Mommy 1979

During the last month of pregnancy I would wake each morning, sit in Samuel's nursery rocking chair (belonged to my grandparents, see left and right), place my hand on my belly and pray for his health. I'd call out body parts and organs and functions to God and declare health over them.

Samuel was born three days past his due date by induction.  Labor Day weekend was approaching, we didn't want to take the chance of having an "on call" doctor.  Induced at 8am, he was born at 2:37pm at 8 pounds.  Healthy.  Thank you Jesus!  Yes, he had flat thumbs and funny looking feet, a birthmark on his forehead and hairier than all get out - so was I, my brother and his boys.  None of that mattered to me, he was perfect, he was healthy.  I love him.

The next day the pediatrician made his rounds.  He took Samuel to the nursery for the exam.  When he returned he brought with him four nurses, one of which came straight to my bedside and held my hand.  I thought, "That's odd."  The doctor began by saying, "Let me start with the light side.  He has a broken collar bone."  I'm thinking, "A BROKEN BONE??!!  That's the 'light side'???"  He proceeded to ask us unusual questions about us and our family, even asked for family photos.  Then pointed out characteristics about Samuel:  

Mommy & Samuel - 1 day old

Birth mark on the forehead
Hairy
Receding jaw
Small nostrils
Flat thumbs
Spread toes
Undescended testicles
The list goes on...

He ordered an ultrasound of the kidneys because of the testicles.  He hinted around that he knew what this was but didn't want to diagnose him or even tell us what he thought it was.  We were bewildered to say the least.  Terrified really.

The ultrasound showed that the kidneys were healthy but they couldn't locate the testicles.  He wouldn't latch on, so I pumped and fed him through a syringe; thus, he wasn't producing enough pee diapers for them to release us from the hospital.  They gave my baby a deadline of 5pm, if he didn't pee by then, we'd have to stay another night.  We prayed so hard for our sweet little boy to pee.  

This sent me into a tailspin.  My Papaw, (whom Samuel was named after and whom the rocking chair had belonged) had just passed a year before this.  His kidneys were failing along with his heart, he had no appetite.  I prayed and prayed for my Pappaw to eat and pee.  Now, I was having to pray the same prayer over my little Samuel.  It was too much.

Papaw, at his house, 5 months before he passed

My faith was being tested for sure.  I thought I had the faith for my Papaw's healing.  But the faith required for your own child is a different kind of faith.  Just days before Papaw passed he looked at me and my husband in the eyes and said, 

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for..."


We finished, "...The evidence of things not seen" 


Hebrews 11:1


Samuel waited til an hour after his deadline and peed so much that it came out of his diaper all over me, my husband and the bed.  We held each other, soaked in joyful tears and pee.