So The Recipe Begins

A recipe can be tweaked over time, to have the perfect outcome.  But with baking, all of your ingredients must be exactly precise, one little extra inch of an ingredient can totally change the end product. If you know me, you know I love to cook, but especially bake. This type of scenario spills over into other aspects of our lives, for instance starting a family.  A little over 2 years ago I married the man of my dreams. We knew as soon as we wed, we wanted to start our family.  So I started to take prenatal vitamins, about 3 months before our wedding. This reminds me of preheating your oven, without taking prenatal's or preheating your oven, what you've worked so hard to create could come out differently. 

 

We found out on my husbands birthday 6/11/09 that we were going to be parents! We were over joyed and made our 1st OB appt for 1 month later, to confirm.  Then had our 1st ultrasound 2 weeks later to see our "gummy bear".  Our 2nd & final ultrasound was 2 months later & we were told "It's a Boy".  The ultrasound tech said "everything looks perfect" & we were elated.  We then scheduled a 4D ultrasound with an outside company, so our close friends & family could join us in seeing all of Breighton's features. It's like looking through the oven door & seeing your cupcakes rise perfectly with a beautiful domed shape.  I still get a huge lump in my throat & chills every time I think of this. . . . My husband asked her to go over Breighton's spine. She did as he asked & said to us "It looks PERFECT".  So we moved on & kept doing everything "right".  No lifting heavy objects, ate healthy, worked out until 2 weeks before I gave birth, took my vitamins, I did everything I was "suppose" to do. 

So the day inched near, that I would be induced at 39 weeks.  It's like taking the cupcakes out 1 minute early, because your anxious to have a bite. So on 2/10/10 with only 4 pushes, out came that perfect finished product.  It was the happiest & scariest moment of our lives.  My doctor started screaming "Someone grab the baby!!". There was blood every where, I was so nervous & had no clue what was happening.  The nurses took him & wheeled him away.  I laid there confused & heart broken, not understanding what was unfolding right in front of my eyes.  She then proceeded to tell me, that had a short umbilical cord, which popped when he came out.  She had to hurry & clamp it with her hand, so he wouldn't bleed out. I felt a sigh of relief, "Oh OK, I can handle that."  Then came the words that would break me down emotionally that I thought there was no return.  "There's a hole in his back", my husband asked "Is it Spina Bifida". She looked shocked & said "yes". As you may know, our wonderful friends Chris & Selina had a beautiful little girl 8 months before, which has Spina Bifida.  This is how we knew a little bit about what SB is. 

When you take your cupcakes out & you know you've followed every step to the T & they fall flat & cave in, you ask "WHY, I did everything right".  I found myself asking the question "why" a lot.  It was never "why" me or "why" us, it was always "WHY BREIGHTON".  I went through a sense of mourning, for a child that I never lost, but for my baby that I knew I couldn't take away his pain or his SB.  People would tell me, "God choose ya'll to be his parents, because he only gives special children to special families, who he knows will take care of them." I'm going to be brutally honest, I wanted to scream & say "You have no idea what we are going through". I felt like it was so easy for people to say this to us & then go home to their "well babies", while I sat in the NICU with mine.


That feeling like all the others faded fast & I started to realize how blessed we truly were.  God did choose us & we could only be so lucky to be given one of his beautiful angels. So just like a recipe, even though you thought you did everything the right way, the finished product is actually so much sweeter than anticipated.  Even though it may not look or taste like all the other cupcakes from the recipe, you wouldn't change one thing about it. Our unwritten recipe turned out perfect. . . . . Our kind of perfect!

(After 10 days in the NICU, we finally brought our baby boy home)