Praise You in This Storm

Wow. My life has changed over the past four days. Where to begin. If this post reads a bit lost, then it shows exactly how I feel at the moment. We are kind of living in a daze…

Hannah came down with the flu last saturday. My birthday of course. She felt better Tuesday, no fever or anything. Wednesday came and she had rapid breathing, fever spiked to 103+, and her lips were blue. Amos took her to Urgent Care and her vitals were so off they thought their machines weren’t working. The Dr sent her to the ER immediately via Ambulance because he didn’t want to take her off the oxygen. She only had 70% oxygen in her lung and was breathing over 65 breaths in a minute.

Xray shows Pneumonia in one lung. So she is in the ER for hours until we get into a room. They were trying to decide if she should stay there or be transferred to a PICU. They kept her. Later that evening her heart rate raised to 170-180 consistently and she was on quite a bit of oxygen. She couldn’t breath on her own. The head nurse and doctor decided to transfer her. So around 2am Thursday she was transferred to Temple’s Scott &White PICU.

The doctors in the PICU began to treat her “aggressively” because Hannah now had double Pneumonia and was getting worse. They said she was not doing well and she was very weak. Her heart was working overtime and was going to give out if she didn’t make a quick turnaround. They had her vented, but knew they may need to put her on full support. When she didn’t get better over the next several hours, we decided to bring the kids to the hospital Thursday morning late in case something happened and they needed to come in. It makes my stomach tight just remembering that conversation with Amos to bring then down to the hospital and how we were supposed to tell them Hannah may die. How do tell your young children that?

Amos and I just sat there in that room holding each other, crying, praying, scared and broken knowing we may not bring her home. We couldn’t imagine our lives without Hannah. What would this do to the kids? What would it do to Amos? What would it do to me? We were having a hard time accepting the situation and were completely in the hands of our Father. Total dependance on Him, just like Hannah and that vent.

It had all happened so fast. 24 hrs before she was fine. Now she was near death. How does that give you enough time to accept the moment you are in? It doesn’t.

Enter God.

Via Facebook (all you FB haters just bear with me), texting, phone calls what have you, people began to hear about Hannah. I decided to post on my status Thursday about her since so many people already knew. Well, the result was amazing. At one point I sat down with the phone to make a phone call but wanted to see what others were talking about so logged onto Facebook. Every single status was about Hannah. Friends, family, even strangers were posting about her. I just broke down. I needed that encouragement from God to let me know He has it under control. I received messages from all over the U.S. from people saying they were praying for her. It was awesome.

Thursday evening she made a drastic turn. For the better. She turned so much that around midnight, they dropped her to 4 hours vented and 2 hours on just the nasal cannula. By Friday morning, she was OFF the vent and strictly on the nasal cannula. So she went all day Friday with little oxygen and vitals getting better. Today she is in a regular pediatric room. No oxygen going. No tubes. No IV’s. No monitors. She is sleeping soundly like she would at home…which by the way, she will be going home in a couple more days.

I give praise to my Lord Jesus Christ. I am just so thankful He allows us to raise her and I am filled with joy that we get to continue to do so.

Wow. My life has changed over the past four days.