Update on Turner

For those of you who read our blog, I hope you find it information and uplifting, but my real intent is to make these sort of like journal entries and hopefully document our journey so that our posterity and others may be uplifted and may see the Lord's hand in our lives. We have seen it for sure!

Turner is doing great. On Thursday, April 10th, we received the news that Turner's 1st biopsy came back an "inconclusive" because the tissue sample was not large enough to be able to tell for sure if the cells that needed to be there were there or not. So on Friday morning they decided to do ANOTHER biopsy and this time they took two samples. The surgeon assured me that they would be able to get results this time and that we should expect them on Wednesday or Thursday of the following week. She also told me that on the tissue from the first biopsy they did not see the cells that they were looking for, so they are 90% sure that it is Hirschspurng's but want to confirm before deciding to operate. We appreciate that, even though it's hard to think of them doing a 2nd biopsy.

On Friday night, Brandon joined me and got to hold our bundle of joy. There is a love between the two of them that is tangible. You can feel it. It amazes me. Turner perks right up and opens his eyes when Brandon talks to him, like he knows that it's his Dad. It's adorable. As far as his health, Turner's stomach bile was looking less and less green when they pumped it out and started to look more brown/clear - we were shooting for clear. The nurse suggested that we start putting a little breast milk on the nipple of a pacifier and let him suck on that to soothe him. HE LOVED IT. He couldn't get enough of it. The nurse indicated that was a good sign because that showed that he wanted to eat. Later that afternoon, they decided to take the stomach pump out. It was amazing to see him without it. He wasn't gagging anymore, and he seemed more content when he slept.

On Saturday morning they started letting us feed him through a bottle. Starting small, 5 cc's every three hours. That's pretty much like 2 tsp. It's tiny. We fed that to him and would then have to give him the pacifier because you could tell he wanted to keep eating and eating. They still have him on TPN (Total Prenatal Nutrition) so that he is getting everything his body needs. Brandon and I also got to experience doing our very first rectal flush. We are now the kind of parents that celebrate when they see poop! I never thought I would be....but here I am....Happy when we see green and brown stool coming out during the flush. We tell him everyday that we need him to learn to do that without our help :) Saturday was a really positive day....until I dropped my phone in the toilet.

I believe that God has a really good sense of humor because he works his miracles, in some pretty funny ways. So I had my phone in my back pocket and went to pull them down (Sorry TMI, but I hope we all pull our pants down to use the restroom) and I hear a kirplunk! I hadn't used the restroom yet so there was still clean water, so I grabbed my phone out as fast as I could (I don't know what I would have done, had it not been clean water, I probably would have left it). I was totally bummed because I lost all my pictures and texts and phone numbers, etc. but we had just gotten back and I wanted to go in and see Turner so we put it in the diaper bag and decided we would stop at a Verizon store on the way home. Now, let me stop here to say that we do not know the birth father of Turner. We have never met him and the one picture that we did see was blurry and you couldn't see his face, but we knew his first name, but not his last. (For privacy purposes I have changed it here). okay....back to the story...... So we walk into Verizon and the sales clerk greets us and I notice that his name is Dorward, the same name as our birth father, and that he is tan and has dark hair and green/hazel eyes, just like our Dorward had been described to us. So I tell Brandon to text Ashlea (our birth mother) and ask her what his last name is. She texts us back his last name and it matches the name tag!!! THEN Brandon takes a picture of him and send it to Ashlea, and she confirms that it is him!! It was CRAZY! So he helped me get my new phone and we chatted for about an hour as he was working on setting everything up. I never brought up the adoption (because lets be honest, we want him to forget about it and not cause any problems) but he was joking around with us and said "I could do that, but it would cost you your first born." HOW IRONIC! We felt it was a miracle because here we are, going through all this stuff with the adoption, wondering about the birth father and who he is and what his personality is like.....all those questions answered by one cell phone dropping in a hospital toilet.

On Sunday, Brandon and I got to cuddle Turner for most of the day and then we had to take a discharge class where they teach you how to do basic "baby care" before you get home, and they make all parents take it before they can take their baby home. There was one couple that had quadruplets, it made me count my blessing of just having the one. I don't think I could do 4 in the NICU at one time! That would be crazy stressful. We felt the power of prayer and fasting on Sunday as we had lots of friends and family fast with us for Turner to have better health and to heal quickly.

Today, Monday, April 14 - I went in to see Turner first thing in the morning and he was looking great. They are increasing his bottle feedings to 15 cc's and after 2 feedings he will go to 20 cc's and then up again after two more feedings, continually increasing until they reach 60 cc's. I think if they would let him he would eat 120 right away but that would make his tummy hurt. They are still doing rectal flushes because he is still not stooling on his own, but the stool that they are getting is the color they are looking for! He is a big baby and might not fit into the clothes that we bought for him! He is definitely out of Newborn sizes and can probably fit into 3 month outfits.

We have felt so much support, from people dropping off sweet gifts and sweets, to offering to sit with us as the hospital, or simply sharing kind words. We love our friends and family!