The Eye of Kris

A lot has happened since I made the initial post declaring that mother and baby were both doing fine (that was only minutes after he was born). It’s a very long story, and maybe one day I’ll write out the whole thing, but for now I will summarize.

Ivan is about a month premature (just over 36 weeks). As a result, his lungs are a little underdeveloped, and we noticed pretty quickly that he was breathing a little funny, and possibly even struggling a bit at it. After working with him at the house for a little while, our midwife contacted a pediatrician she knows and he recommended we bring the baby down to Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital.

To make a long story short, he was looked at by a dozen doctors, and went from the walk-in clinic to the emergency room to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). Chest x-rays revealed that his lungs were a little young and that he had a pocket of air in his chest next to one of the lungs that was restricting his breathing. Several doctors assured me that this was not unusual in early births, and that many children have a mild case of this (I forget what they call it – they’ve been throwing a lot of terms at me) that goes unnoticed and resolves itself over time.

Their main concern was not that it would be a long term problem, but that he would not get enough oxygen which could obviously cause other, more serious problems.

So, he spent last night in the NICU with a breathing tube down his throat, and oxygen tubes in his nose. The doctor estimated that he will have to be here about a week. Mary and I have been given a room here at the hospital to sleep in, so at least for the moment we are living here. Owen is with the Fadelys, and is having a blast playing with his buddy Dean.

As of this afternoon, the tube has been removed, and he was breathing on his own, but still working a little harder at it than they would like. They may have to put the tube back in, but will try some other methods of assisted breathing before they go that far. The pocket of air in his chest is almost completely gone. He’s still getting oxygen, but he’s down to about 30% of where he started.

Mary is doing well. She is sore, and of course tired, but otherwise feeling good.

I cannot even begin to tell you how much God has blessed us during this process. From the moment I walked in, He has given us favor and led the right people to “happen by” and take some action to help Ivan. As one example, the NICU normally does not accept any babies that were not actually born at Vanderbilt. I still don’t know who made that decision or what led to it, but I know that God was here before me preparing the way.

I will try to update as we get new information. I don’t have a lot of time to just sit and write, but hopefully I can update at least once a day, and Mary will try to get on and write her side of the story as well.

Thank you to everyone who has been praying for us and especially for Ivan, and please continue to do so.

God is good!