Brigham Update

I got to spend the weekend with Justin, Rebecca, Carrie and baby Brigham. It was so great to finally meet Brigham. It was very hard seeing him hooked up to so many tubes, IV's and not being able to hold him. I was able to hold his hand, touch his head and hair (it's a beautiful highlighted blond color), or his feet.
He is still swollen from all the fluids they are giving him. His kidneys are working but can't keep up with all the blood products and fluids being added. He is on the ECMO machine, it is the heart lung bypass machine, it allows his lungs to rest and let the machine do the work. Eventually, he will need to come off the machine and learn to breathe on his own. He still needs to have surgery to correct his intestines and liver being in the chest cavity, those will be moved to where they are supposed to be, it hopefully will also relieve pressure on his lungs and the hypertension might subside. He has a long road ahead of him and so Justin and Rebecca are having others besides just family help with Carrie, bring in meals once in awhile and they are going to stay some with Rebecca's parents so they can cut down on the drive back and forth. It is about 45 minutes to an hour from their home to the hospital. Justin would prefer they be able to be at home, but they will give this a try.
To find out the latest updates, go to their blog at justinandrebeccagreer.blogspot.com

Brigham Justin Greer is Here!!!!

Born at 2:03pm January 7th, (One week before my birthday) 6lbs 5 ozs, dark hair and lots of it!
So excited and happy for Justin, Rebecca and Carrie.
Rebecca did incredible! 3 1/2 hours basically from the time she got the Pitocin and had Brigham.
There will be up and down days as we watch Brigham progressing through his diaphramatic hernia problem. Surgery will be in the next several days and the doctors will continue to watch him carefully in the NCIU. He is intubated and on an oscillating ventilator.
Earl and I hope to go to Arizona in the next several days to help in whatever way we can.
It is so hard not being "there" and wanting to help.
I'm reminded of how fragile life is and when one of these babies comes, it truly is a miracle. Each and every one of them are created by our Heavenly Father and it is just incredible how perfect they are.