Evelyn Eira Sue

     It's been five weeks since we met our little miracle for the first time. Five weeks ago, scared to death of a major surgery, anticipating complications, we were getting into our car at four thirty in the morning. It was then that I realized that our whole life was about to change and that we were finally about to meet this precious baby God had put in my womb and so tenderly cared for.

       The pain from the pregnancy had become so severe that I hadn't been sleeping or eating, and barely functioning over the last three weeks. I longed for each night and when it came would fall into bed so exhausted and desperate for sleep and relief from the agonizing contractions and searing internal pain, I would beg God to break my waters, or to make it obvious to me that the big moment had come. I spent the last three weeks in tears, with prayers on my lips and desperation in my heart. Every morning I'd get up wondering if I would make it through the day, wondering if I could take one more step, lift one more basket, or make one more lunch.


       On the morning of September 10th, I walked out our front door, scared but so ready to have this baby. I was ready to meet this child that I never dreamed I'd be able to love and call my own. We walked into the hospital and from the first moment I knew it was going to be a good day. The nurses were so kind and gentle with me; they were attentive and reassuring at every moment as I was prepped for the operation. Everything went so smoothly, from the IV to the labs and everything else under the sun.

       I had been praying that my doctor would be open to trying a gentle cesarean; a c-section where the baby is immediately placed on the mother's chest after birth encouraged to nurse and bonding through the skin on skin. I knew that there was a chance they would be able to prevent me from going into shock following the procedure if I could feel the baby on my chest. I wanted that experience more than I could put into words. When I asked the nurse, she was honest with me. They had never done a gentle c-section before, they weren't set up to be able to do it, they didn't have space. She did offer to bring the baby and hold her to my face right after birth until I was stitched up. I was grateful just for that.

       As they were rolling me into the OR, my doctor met me and told me she was going to have the nurses move some things to make a true gentle c-section possible. I cried. It was more than I had hoped. It ended up being a more peaceful and beautiful birth I had dared imagine. Again, God took a situation where the odds were against me and made something beautiful out of it. At 8:12 am, weighing 7lbs and 6 ounces, 21 inches long, Evelyn Eira Sue Jaffrey was carefully placed on my chest; Alex and I were holding our miracle for the very first time.

         Every moment of the fears and pain I faced through the pregnancy melted away like packed ice in early spring when everything begins to come to life. We spent the next three days in the hospital with our new daughter savoring the moments of newness and the reality of the blessing we were physically holding, kissing and cherishing. She was the baby the world told us we would never hold, now sleeping peacefully in my arms. She is the kind of miracle that shouts the power of my God.

        The following five weeks have only intensified the testimony of what God has done with this babies life and my life. The doctors were expecting healing to be a long rocky road and virtually filled with potholes due to some other health conditions I have. To everyone's surprise, especially my own, two weeks post surgery I was up and walking without medication and five weeks later fully back to myself.