One crazy year - Happy Birthday Baker!

So here we are, 364 days since our life changed. On this day twelve months ago, I woke up in the morning knowing something was wrong with Teresa. We were up all night with what were described as “contractions that were figments of Teresa’s imagination”. One of the doctor’s from the group came in like they did every day prior to this doing the perfunctory high risk pregnancy checkup – making another $100 hello call. He gave us the reassurances of the day, everything is fine – the contractions aren’t contractions and stop worrying about it. We are almost there just a few days from what they considered “viability” for the baby 24 weeks… Heartbeat is strong, momma doing ok? Oh you had pains all night in a regular pattern? Those weren’t contractions but we’ll check in on you later this afternoon to see what’s going on….

It seems like a century ago, the trauma the pain the beeps of the monitor’s the uncertainty, the specialists with conflicting but never positive opinions on the final outcome for Baker… It all seem so far away – lost in this hazy memory of bad news on top of bad news with a little dash of hope here in there. We went through a crash course in neonatology and statistics, always weighing conflicting decisions to try to improve the probability; bump up the percentages a few points for the positive, always knowing that the experts had no idea what they were talking about…. And finally leaving most of the outcome in God’s hands….
And here we are a year later and our boy is absolutely perfect. We never expected an outcome like this, never thought it was possible. He continues to amaze us every day. He’s catching up to babies his age. He’s on a growth chart finally. He talks on and on and on (well in his own language but still.) He’s crawling and trying to walk. He is happy all the time. We have lost all the specialists but one, and I’m sure after the next visit the ophthalmologist will not have to see us again for a long while his vision is perfect.

We had a little birthday party for Baker you can get all the pictures here. This past year has been a trial, and we want to thank all of you for the support, inspiration and love sent our way. We are not just celebrating our miracle boy's birthday, but celebrating every one of you who contributed to our familie's well being during this past year. Thank you all for making Baker's first birthday... the greatest birthday we've ever celebrated...