spring break and baby update....

Ahh. Spring Break. Yesterday was nice, I slept in until 6:30 and then the whole family ate breakfast together, since our time allowance was greater. The boys went to the babysitter’s yesterday and today for me to run errands and get to doctor appointments. After we took them, I was able to sit and drink my coffee and have my devotions and it was LIGHT outside. Amazing. I cleaned all morning and then ran errands in the afternoon. When I picked the boys up, we planted some flowers (I went with the actual flowers this time- not the seeds-although our previous harvest did great!) The boys loved having my direct attention when we got home instead of me having to cook dinner. We went on a bike ride with dad when he got home. Although those have proven to test our patience with Ian stopping every other minute for some reason or another.
Anyway- today was my doc appointment to check on Libby’s scan (that’s the name we have in case some of you didn’t know yet). Right as I was getting ready to leave, I couldn’t find my phone anywhere. I knew many people had demanded a call following the appointment- but what could I do? So I left without the phone. Probably 2 minutes after I got on the freeway, I heard a really weird sound coming from my car. I was only going 55 so it was really bizarre. It got louder and louder and the only thing I could predict was that one of my tires was getting dangerously close to blowing. But I was on the freeway in the middle of huge road project that has been going on for months so the shoulder was almost non-existent. So I just continued. It got louder and louder and my car was slowly down voluntarily. I knew I was in trouble but my options were fairly limited. Finally- the pop came, and the tire blew. I came to a stop on the sliver of a shoulder and could feel the vibrations of every car passing me at 55 mph. No phone. No room to get out. No knowledge if this well-equipped infamous Honda Odyssey even had a spare tire. At that moment, I knew I shouldn’t have begged my dad to sign off on my driver’s ed form that we had practiced changing a tire. I was as vulnerable as I could be. I was all by myself with no phone, pregnant, and in the middle of the freeway, a mile away from any business with a phone. AT LEAST the kids weren’t with me. I considered crying but after weighing where it would get me, I ruled it out. I thought about jumping the median dodging the cars and walking to the first business, and towing the car. But I was really nervous that the car would get hit right there. I was lucky no one had hit me thus far. I kept my seatbelt on and just prayed. I asked God to protect me and send someone to help me. Not 5 seconds later, an Incident Response truck pulled up in front of me. I breathed a sigh of relief and immediately thanked God. The man checked the owner’s manual (I should have thought of that!) and found the spare tire. He changed my tire and let me use his cell phone to let my doc know I would be late. Then he sent me on my way and I arrived to my doctor’s appointment on time. (but then you always wait for another 20-30 minutes anyway- so I don’t know why I get there on time…) So I learned-I need to be well versed in the changing of tires, I need a jack for my birthday to keep in my car and I need On-star or a car phone for when I lose mine!
Then I got to my doc appointment and her bowel still had the same bright coloring on it. After my last appointment they drew blood and found that I have the antibodies for Fifths Disease and she tested negative to the other viral strands. So the infection is ruled out. Now we are down to Cystic Fibrosis or a chromosome disorder the only which she would not have miscarried by now- is Down Syndrome. Now they linked Ian with that too when he had spots on his heart so that is what I have been equating all this with. Yet she said today that she would have disregarding spots on the heart since they are so common. He had less than a 1 % chance. She wasn’t able to give me a percentage with this bowel issue because she said she had never read statistics on that based solely on this one area. But she indicated that it is much more concerning.
On the way home, I decided it was warranted and I allowed a few tears to fall. I wondered if it was selfish to hope that she was a perfect healthy baby. What if God had chosen me to be the parent of a child that needed extensive care and medical resources? Was I up for that task? How would this affect our family? Our marriage? Or maybe she was fine and I was wasting these emotions and thoughts on something we don’t know for sure. I’d naturally assume that she was fine- but I don’t want my positivity to blind me in preparation for something that could be different.
Anyway. I don’t want to grieve or be sad. I don’t want people to say sympathetically, “How ya doing?” I don’t want to cry about it or be scared of her arrival due to the unknown. I’ll try to keep this updated with anything new that I find out, because updating individuals becomes exhausting. You have to be reminded over and over that everything is not fine. So – I’m soliciting all your prayers. Prayers that she will be a beautiful healthy girl, and that if God has allowed her to have any abnormalities, that he will equip us with everything we need to help her and our family thrive.
At any rate, she’s my little precious girl and I want to enjoy this as much as one can enjoy a pregnancy, so I don’t want to taint it with constant talking about the negative aspects that might be accompanying us. So – just pray for Libby and for us to have a continued peace.
Now I’m sitting at Les Schwab. I need to replace 2 tires. Awesome.
Oh well. At least I’m safe.