Miracle #1

My children are miracles. Each pregnancy, in my mind, had to be a complete act of God. He has a funny sense of humor, this God we cherish... but, I wouldn't change the way things played out for anything. Today, I'm going to tell you all about miracle #1

Dylan.

When I was 20, I was told that I could never have children. I spent a while digesting that. Talking it out with my boyfriend, who I had planned to marry. Figuring out how to accept this about myself. I had always seen myself as being a mom. That was my life's goal. for as long as I could remember. It was a hard blow, and dealing with my own fallout over it was difficult. But I did, and then I went back to the doctor to figure out why. No, the doctor didn't tell me why, he just told me I couldn't. Nice Doctor, huh? It gets better....

I saw this doctor a lot over the next few months. I was dealing with severe abdominal pain, had been for years. Long story short, after several months of different stupid treatments that don't work, and tons of frustration on my part... this doctor decides to schedule surgery to diagnose endometriosis.

The week of the surgery, I was scheduled for lots of pre-op stuff at the hospital. One day I had to have chest xrays, another blood work up. On the day that I was there for my blood work up, the nurse started acting a bit funny while reading my paper work. She wanted to know why the doctor hadn't requested a pregnancy test with my blood work. So I tell her that he did a test in the office that was negative. Not blood though, a urine test. She said my dates didn't add up right for her, and that under good concsience she could not sign off on the blood work with out a pregnancy test, and added one to the form. I thanked her, and didn't think anything more on it.

3 days later, the doctor's nurse calls my mom and asks for both of us to come to the office, the Doctor needed to speak to us. My surgery was scheduled for the very next day. We were surprised that the doctor was calling us in, when he would see us first thing in the morning. We thought, maybe, it had to do with a very heated conversation between my mom and the doctor just the day before. He had informed her that his intentions were to do a full historectomy on me, and she informed him that he did not have that consent. In alot more words than that. ;)

When we got to the Doctors office, the nurse immediately takes us back to his actual office, not an exam room, and leaves us there. When the doctor arrives, he brings in two nurses with him... one stands next to me, and the other moves over close to my mom. We were thinking this is all getting kind of strange. And my mom makes a joke to me about the doctor being scared of her.

He sits down at his desk, opens my file and then says "Well, Valeri, I've got good news and better news. Which do you want first?"

"I guess the good news"

"You won't need to come to the hospital tomorrow morning, your surgery has been canceled"

"Really? Why? What happened?" I say as I'm looking back and forth from my mom to the doctor completely and totally confused.

And thats when he says the words that changed my life forever

"The better news is, Valeri, Your Pregnant"

I don't think a body can slump any further into a chair than mine did. To say I was shocked isn't quite enough. I was literally dumbfounded. It felt like the world was in slow motion around me. I watched the Doctor squirm, the nurses smile, then laugh, and I watched as my mom jumped up and down screaming in excitement.

I was 20 years old, not married, and pregnant. It took a while before my mom's kind of excitement hit me.

But it did. I became so very excited with the life that grew inside of me. That was the last time we saw that doctor, soon deciding that my care was better off somewhere else. Can't blame me, he almost killed my baby. I can not imagine what would have happened if not for that nurse at the hospital adding the blood test to the sheet. She saved my son.

My life changed so much in the next few months. I got married, moved out of my parents home. I loved being pregnant. Specially that first time. It was all so wonderful, every single change. I remember the first time I felt him move, the first time I heard his heart beat, when we found out he was a he, all of it...

At 6 months, though, things started to go wrong. I was having contractions alot. And my care had been transferred to UTMB in Galveston, as high risk. On one visit, they didn't let me go home. I had to stay there, at a little hotel like setting, where they kept high risk pregnant ladies that didn't need complete hospital care, but did need daily monitoring. There were 20 of us there, give or take. All of us with different issues going on. I was there because Dylan was breech, and I was 75% effaced... at 6 months. I also had this other issue going on. During the same pre-op test that detected my pregnancy, they also found a mass resting near my heart. That mass became the center of all my medical files, while at UTMB. They believed it was the cause of the difficulties in my pregnancy. My heart was beating so very fast, and there was nothing they could do about it. My heartbeat mirrored the babies so closely that they would often mix them up while monitoring. I can't even begin to count the nights I spent in labor and delivery, hooked up to all kinds of monitors and heart thingamagigs, because my heartbeat had increased or my blood pressure was off. I was watched so very closely. And I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that no matter how frustrating it seemed at the time... I am here, with a very healthy 12 year old, because of their diligence in treating me.

A baby I couldn't have, that almost was taken away by a bad doctor, whose pregnancy was riddled with difficulty going full term to delivery, and is now a very very happy healthy 12 year old. I would say that falls under miracle, Don't you?

Stay tuned for more miracles, Next miracle #2 and #3. Ian And Zachary.