Why God? Why?

We are getting closer and closer to the due date and I can feel the tightness in my chest. Although I am trusting God and trying to focus on him and trying to get mentally prepared for what we are going to face and knowing there is really no way to prepare for the emotions.

I am amazed at the strength of my wife. She is being so strong. We continue to be overwhelmed with the thoughts and prayers and well wishes from everyone. There are so many people that have been so thoughtful and nice to us and sympathetic to Hogan's situation that I can't even start to name anyone for fear of leaving someone out. Just know that if you are reading this post you are someone I want to thank! I know I mention how thankful we are in every post and its because it means more than I can explain! I know that God has given us strength through those prayers and I know that Hogan is feeling the prayers too!

I continue to ask God Why!? Why did I get blessed with such an incredible wife that I don't deserve? Why have we been blessed with 2 beautiful children so far and one on the way? I know there are so many people that can't have children. Why has God blessed our family so much with wonderful friends that care so much about us? Why are strangers praying for us? That is so incredible to me. Why are so many people being so kind and thoughtful? Why are you allowing us to experience the birth of such a special child that has overcome so many odds already? I may not know answers to all of these things but I do know that if I died tonight I would have died a blessed father and husband.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will direct your paths. Proverbs 3:5-6 NLT

Those verses seem to be the "point" that we are focusing on through this journey with Hogan. This week was quite a stressful one for me because we were going to see an endocrinologist about Angie's thyroid and yesterday we were going to see Hogan through an ultrasound at Dr. Rosemond's office again and these ultrasounds would be the ones that would help give us a closer look at the problems that Hogan is facing that are created by the Trisomy 18 condition.

The doctors appointments outcomes were both different than we had expected. We had thought that endocrinologist would just talk to us and tell us to come back to see him after Hogan was born because that was the recommendation that we had gotten from a couple of doctors here in Athens. It wasn't the case. We went to the appointment thinking it was just a consultation and left with Angie having an ultrasound on her thyroid, a biopsy and blood work done. This was a surprise because it seemed to me all along that the doctors wanted to wait until the baby was born because if this was cancer that there was nothing that could be done until Hogan was born. This whole thing is ironic because Angie had an appointment set up to get her thyroid checked the day after we found out we were expecting Hogan so they didn't want to do the normal tests because she was expecting. We have had it measured and blood work checked since then and were sent to Lawrenceville this week to see a specialist. This doctor wanted to go ahead and get it checked because it was half solid and half liquid. I am actually relieved that we will know the results before Hogan is born so that we will know how aggressive we need to be after he is born. This again is another example of how incredible of a wife I have! I asked her about it before we found out Hogan's condition and she told me that she would not do anything different if it was cancer. Angie gave radiation treatments to cancer patients as her profession until we had Noah. She told me that the cancer is usually slow growing in that area even if it was cancer. She wasn't too concerned. She wasn't but I was really concerned. That has probably been a little part of the "fragile" feeling too. In the back of my mind I can't help but think what if Angie has cancer along with everything else. The growth had grown about 25% more since 5 months ago so I am praying that the results will come back benign in 10 days.

Friday we went to see Dr. Rosemond again to get the ultrasound on Hogan. It was the usually appointment with him. We were greeted by the nicest sonographer we could have ever asked for at his office. She has been so kind to us through all of this. She did her initial measurements before Dr. Rosemond came into the room and looked at Hogan. He looked for a while studying the things that he has been watching since the November 18th visit. It always brings back bad memories when we are in his office now but he has been great to us. He has taken extra time with us and answered every question we have ever asked. When he was done taking his look, he told us what he saw. He still saw the heart problems but there were a couple of other things that he saw that weren't "normal". It was a good "not normal" for a Trisomy baby! Hogan was 3 weeks behind in development at our last visit. This is normal for Trisomy babies. They usually slow down and don't develop normally after 20 weeks. The unusual thing was that Hogan was only a couple of weeks now! He is growing better than most with his condition. There was one other thing that was a miracle to me. Dr. Rosemond had told us of a problem that hurt me to think about for Hogan that I couldn't really get out of my mind over the past couple of months along with others but he didn't mention it this time so I specifically asked him about it. He told us that it actually looked better now... he said it looked pretty normal now! That was not the only thing that he told us. He told us that not only did he think that our chance was pretty good for a live birth but that he thinks that Hogan might live for a few days!! He did obviously say that he can't guarantee anything for sure but that from what he saw on his ultrasound that he was optimistic! Angie and I both had tears of joy in our eyes when he told us all of these things. We are so thankful. I am almost nervous to get excited about it because I fear it won't turn out the way he thinks but... praise God for the hope!

We have gone from almost no hope in November of a live birth to a chance for a live birth in January. We are now hearing that we have a chance that we might be able to bring Hogan home with us. WOW! He did tell us that with Trisomy 18 we will not know a lot until Hogan enters the world but we continue to hope and pray that he enters the world alive and that we have a chance to spend some time with him. We will be so thankful for every moment. Isn't it interesting that we feel this way about Hogan. Isn't this the way we should feel about every relationship we have in this world? I know I will soak up every moment with Hogan. I am so thankful for everyday on this earth. I am overwhelmed that God has blessed us so much!

Funny thing today...I was about to take a shower mid morning when I cranked up my "tennis mix" on my ipod. I know thinking about me dancing before I take a shower isn't a pretty mental image but at least I did have my clothes on at the time! If you know anything about my music taste then you know it is anything and everything! I picked up my little princess Lily and started dancing to the song "Brickhouse". It wasn't long before Noah came running into the bathroom to see what the fuss was all about and joined us dancing. Of course, playing basketball years ago at Dublin High, I have a love for "black music". One of my sister's majored in piano performance at UGA so I like that music too. I also lived most of my life in middle Georgia so I have to like Country! So we went from Soulja Boy, Wild Cherry and the Stones to Darius Rucker's song "Alright". I was singing his song "Alright" beautifully while dancing with Noah and Lily when I realized that not only do I like the flow of the song but I love the words to that song too. It basically talks about being "Alright" with simple blessings and not having to have the finest or best. When I hear the song and its words my mind thinks about the fact that if you are a christian that you will be "Alright" no matter what happens in life. You can have family tragedy, you can lose your job, you can lose your car, you can lose all worldly things but if you are a believer you can't have your faith taken from you. If you have a chance to listen to it check it out, you will know what I mean and if not, just ask me and I will sing it for you! We have so much to be thankful! Life could be so much worse. We are so excited that we have been given hope of spending time with Hogan!