this is not going to be as pretty as i’d like it to be. it might even be a little messy and uncomfortable and for that i’ll apologize.
many of you have been following my wife’s blog. she’s real good about sharing real stories of life in our family. she’s also pretty quick about it. me? i like to mull over the nuances of each word and select the precise one for the occasion. so it takes me a while… I am learning that i don’t have “a while” as often as i used to. a small part of me feels philosophically torn by this objective reality, and the other parts of me tell me to quit babbling and whining and using uppity sounding words to communicate what you already know. LIFE IS BUSY, AND WE ALL HAVE THINGS TO DO.My blog is not supposed to be about family. i have imposed this “limitation” on myself. In my mind this is supposed to be where you come to read about all the awesome things that God is doing through us and with us to reach into unreached people groups around the globe. And i fail at sharing those things on a regular basis, often because i feel inadequate and ill prepared to sit down and throw my thoughts on the screen… tonight is different. I’m not going to do THAT.
I’m going to do this:
Yesterday at 1pm Tamara finally caved in and called the OB doctor to ask about a persistent headache. Combined with her hypertension and blurred vision, they were concerned enough that they had her head into the Labor and Delivery department. She called me out of a meeting to tell me that i’d need to come home to be with Isaac and pick up Emma from soccer practice. Tamara was in there for 4hours before they decided that they were going to need to admit her and see if she would need to be transferred to a hospital that could safely manage a 31 week old baby, because there was a good chance that if they couldn’t get her blood pressure under control, momma and baby would be in pretty dire straits. Words like preeclampsia and PIH were thrown and i looked them up. none of them were even a little bit good.
30 hours later and i am finally getting to write this. It has been a whirlwind, a roller coaster, a rodeo of tests and medications and emails and phone calls and texts as we watched the body of Christ show us the love of Christ BEAUTIFULLY! Genetic family and spiritual family and friends of all kinds have literally come out of nowhere (that i was aware of!) to help and offer their service. for the sake of privacy, i’ll not mention them by name, here. you can email me if you want the beautiful details.
Tamara is still in the hospital. she may remain there for a couple days more, while they get her BP stabilized and lowered. EVEN after she gets those stabilized, i’m told we play this day-to-day. ABSOLUTE BEDREST UNTIL YOU’RE NOT PREGNANT.
This means that i need to play a new side of the dad game board.
Would you please pray that i’ll live out the love of Christ for my kids and wife? it seems so easy to save all that stuff “for the office” sometimes, to almost lavish it on the students or fellow staff. what a miserable excuse for a husband and father! that’s not how God treats me when i’m needing help! Pray that Tamara and bambino numero cinco will play nicely together for AT LEAST 3 more weeks? The doctor (AND us!) would really prefer 9 more, because 1 day in the womb is roughly equivalent to 3 in the NICU!
I’m going to bed now. Resting in the fact that my Heavenly Father is NOT.