a taste....

As I was looking up the lyrics for a song by Josh Wilson called Before the Morning, I came across a short video that was made as a background for why he wrote the song in the first place. Friends of his have a story somewhat similar to ours. But most importantly, it reminded me of a taste of all the amazing miracles we witnessed God perform firsthand in the life of our baby boy.



First for the similarities...

1. Both of our families were blessed with a healthy, beautiful, smart daughter as our first child.
2. When Malachi was born and an echo was performed of his heart, so many things were wrong. Although he had four pumping chambers, his first surgery would be the same as if he were diagnosed with hypoplastic left heart syndrome. Malachi's open heart surgery was performed at a week or two of age as he had a more urgent surgical repair that needed to take place first.
3. The daunting site of seeing our babies hooked up to so many machines and wires and cables both before and after surgery.
4. We would not be able to afford the medical bills on our own.
5. We were told our marriage would certainly suffer and were told the divorce rate for parents in these situations skyrockets.
6. We were told Chi would have minimal, if any, quality of life.
7. Our heart surgeon was a believer.
8. Neither set of parents knew what to do--except fight for our baby!

Beyond the similarities of our situations, there are so many miracles God chose to work out particularly in our family--tailored to fit our son. It would be very beneficial to me to go back and try to recall as many of those miracles as possible, but here are simply a few that come to mind...
1. Nothing showed up on ultrasound. No abnormalities or dysfunctions, nothing. I've come to think of this as a good thing, a blessing. If something had shown up at the 20-week ultrasound, I wouldn't even be able to imagine the crazy mess I would have been starting at that point. Instead, God was working in my heart and John's heart to prepare us (granted, at the time, we had envisioned preparation for moving to China).
2. Malachi's heart abnormalities played out the same was as that of a left hypoplastic syndrome. No doctor could explain to us why his fourth chamber was working.
3. There is a small vessel that provides oxygen to the baby's blood stream while in utero which closes a day or two after delivery. This vessel stayed open long enough for the doctors to accurately assess Chi's heart anatomy and begin medication to keep that vessel open until heart surgery could be performed (after recovery from his TEF repair).

Like I said, those are just a few of the miracles. Doctor after doctor has told us that there is no human explanation for how Malachi survived nearly seven months. He truly was our Little Man of Steel--as long as God would all him to be.