Some Updated Info

Thank you all for your prayers and phone calls and emails. Our God is a powerful God and we feel his loving arms around us.

I'm ready to tell a little about what happened today.

I had on and off contractions through the night that I figured were nothing. I got up around 4 because I was sick of lying in bed through them. At 4.30 my waters broke with a huge gush. For those of you that have seen me recently, you know I was huge. After the waters broke I was so happy to be at a more manageable size. Labor was still quite irregular throughout the morning. My midwife came and checked on us and was happy to hear a very strong and happy heartbeat. She also checked to make sure there were no concerns with cord prolapse due to the excessive fluid we had told her about, and she found baby's head nice and low and no cord issues what so ever. She checked heart tones during a contraction and found that baby's heartrate dipped a concernable amount, but did go back to normal. We decided to moniter it closely and hoped that labor would pick up quickly, so that we would have babe in arms soon. Around noon I lay down upstairs and things got intense quickly. By 1, I was feeling pushy. She checked the fetal tones through my contraction and immediately expressed her concern over the drop in heartrate--baby was clearly not happy. We all decided that moment to jump in the car and head to the hospital. She called ahead, and they were ready for us when we got there.

We settled into the hospital about 1.30 and they hooked us up to the monitors. They said that yes the tones were low but they were not panicking. Since I was completely dialated and ready to push, they said I should go ahead and push the baby out. After about 5 contractions or so and some ineffective pushing they said they were getting concerned now, and since baby was not popping out quickly, they suggested c-section. We immediately agreed.

The c-section was truly emergency. They did not take the time to do a spinal, rather they put me under general. They waited until the scapel was to the flesh and then put me under. They say that 2 minutes later, Eleanor Rose Vedra was delivered.

From what I hear, she was not breathing, but they were very prepared and quickly put a breathing tube down. The tube was very effective, and she pinked up immediately. They then took her down to the NICU. Adam was able to get a glimpse of her on the way, but otherwise he was not able to be in the surgery or anything.

After I woke up, they told me that my midwife had saved my baby's life by monitering us at home, and it was good that we came when we did. They also told me that I had a baby GIRL! Eleanor was in the NICU for troubled breathing but supposedly things looked good and her gas levels were already increasing. We were encouraged and hoped to have her by us by nightfall.

Unfortunately, the bad news came later that afternoon. But first the good news from the NICU doctor. The breathing problems that Eleanor had were under contrqol, and they were confident that she would be able to wean off the respirator in the next couple of days. But then the bad news: Pretty much unrelated to the breathing issue as far as the Dr could tell, Eleanor is quite listless and not moving around a lot. She is not really reacting to stimuli normally, and they are very concerned about this. Since this is not due to the breathing issues, what is causing this?

A couple of bad signs are the fact that I had so much fluid--she may have not been processing the fluid well in the womb, unbeknownst to us. Another thing was that when they took the placenta, they noticed that it had detatched in a few spots from the wall. Had this happened a couple of times over the last weeks? they don't know yet.

So, the worst case scenario at this point is that she would remain quite listless, and they will need to test to find out if she has any defects or diseases. The testing could potentially take place at DeVos Children's. The best case is that she would perk up in the next few days, come off the ventilator, and be home with us by the end of the weekend.

Now for the update. I was just down to see Eleanor and she is beautiful. She was kicking her legs and stretching her arms. The nurse was not terribly impressed with that, but I certainly was. I was able to spend some time praying over her and sang "Great is thy Faithfulness" to her. I was very encouraged to see her, though it was also heartbreaking. I am able to go see her "whenever I want" and will get updates frequently I hope.

Some more detailed info you all were waiting for:
Eleanor Rose Vedra (eventually called Ellie)
6 lbs 5 ounces
20.25" long
born 9.12.07 at 2:06 pm

Again, we so appreciate your prayers and encouraging phone calls and emails. We are finding strength in the Lord's faithfulness and feel his hand upon us.

Love,
Emily
vedrafamily@yahoo.com

email me and I can get you a phone number if you want to talk.

*pardon the spelling, typos, etc. no spell check and didn't want to look stuff up....