Charlotte Grace

Charlotte Grace arrived on February 12th at 2:02 am. At birth she weighed 7 lb 4 oz and was 19.5." Labor lasted most of the day on Wednesday, though it wasn't overly consistent or strong until around 6:00pm. Will was a fantastic birthing coach, and my midwife and nurse were incredible. I won't burden you with the details, but if you'd like to hear the banshee screams, I could try to replicate them for you.

Charlotte is absolutely lovely. We are so in love with her already. And we need your prayers. I know that some of you are very underinformed at the moment, so I wanted to put all of the information in one place. As we suspected months ago, Charlotte does indeed have a heart defect. It was confirmed late in the afternoon on the 12th, and she was immediately transferred to the NICU. She has been scheduled for a cardiac catheterization for Tuesday and then open-heart surgery for Wednesday or Thursday to block the connection between her two vessels. She is currently under close monitoring to make sure that the heart defect does not cause any problems before the upcoming surgery. We have been spending all of our free time at the hospital with her, getting lots of good cuddling time before things get more complicated next week. We have been blessed to have family and friends watch Owen for us while we are out of the house (PS. Owen has an awful cold...please pray for him too).

The other concern is that we're not sure what has caused the defect. Charlotte was born without thumbs and with irregularities in the bones of her right lower arm. This probably indicates that she has some type of syndrome. One in particular called Holt-Oram Syndrome (aka heart-hand syndrome) is the leading guess at the moment. She has had a huge number of tests and blood-work done, but the answer to this particular question will take weeks to arrive. All of the other tests appear to be normal. As for improving the hand issues, this is something we're going to be getting more information on, but is not an immediate concern.

Please pray for all of us. This has been such a roller coaster of emotions. Most of the time it's easy to trust in God and His plan in all of this, but then the moments come when you start thinking about the "ifs," and you're fighting back tears. I can use His word to combat these thoughts, but it's still a battle nonetheless. And then there are the moments when you don't even have to think, the emotions just well up and overwhelm you.

Thank you to everyone who has blessed us during this time with help, love, support and prayer. I don't know what we would do without you.