Beckett's Story...Pre-Delivery

So Beckett's story is pretty amazing and for those who haven't followed from the beginning, we thought it'd be cool to see the emails over the months:

November 30, 2007
Friends,

We had our sonogram yesterday and they found some things that they wanted to look at more in depth with the baby. We went into a specialist today at 2pm and were told that the baby has something called a Diaphragmatic Hernia. Basically, this means that the baby has some organs that should be growing in the abdomen that are actually growing higher up in the chest. This means that this is not leaving enough space for the lungs to fully grow.

The doctor told us that from what she saw today, the baby is fine within the womb, but once it's delivered, there is a long road ahead. She told us that when they find this problem this early in the pregnancy there is a 20% chance that the baby would live upon delivery. If that happens there will need to be a lot of treatment and surgeries to help the baby breathe and hope for the lungs to properly grow.

Needless to say, we are pretty shocked right now and could use your prayers.

December 6, 2007
Hello Everyone,

For those of you who haven't heard, we went in for a 19 week sonogram last week and got some pretty startling news. Our baby boy was diagnosed with a Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia. This basically means that there are some organs growing in the upper part of the chest cavity and making it difficult for the lungs to grow properly. We were told that the baby has a 20% chance at living once he's born.

We've received a ton of calls and emails from many of you and that sure does mean a lot to us. We have people praying all over the place and I'd like nothing more than to respond to each of you in April with news of a miracle.

To keep everyone in the loop and know what to pray for, we figured we'd send out any periodic updates as we can.

Today, we went in for an amniocentesis. While we were in, the doctor did another sonogram and it showed that the stomach is still forming in the upper part of the chest (hence the lungs don't have much room to grow). She made it through the actual amniocentesis like a champ and it seemed to be successful. She's at home and doing well right now. This test is basically to determine whether there are any defects such as Down's syndrome with our baby. We'll get the test back in a couple of weeks.

With all the things on our plate right now, we'd sure love to get some good news back in a couple of weeks from those test results. If you all wouldn't mind praying for the results of that test along with the growth of the baby's lungs, we would appreciate it.

Thank you again for all of your love and support.

December 14, 2007
Hi All,

Just wanted to share a bit of encouraging news with everyone. We went to the Pediatric Cardiologist yesterday to make sure that our baby's heart is ok. Apparently, there are sometimes some issues with heart disease and impingement on the heart with this congenital diaphragmatic hernia diagnosis.

We had an ECHO test performed and everything seems to be normal with the heart...except for a displacement to the right which the doctor didn't seem worried about at all. Apparently, this is easily resolved with the surgery to reposition the stomach. Seemed like it should be more complicated to us, but it looks like that shouldn't be a huge concern.

Anyway, we were excited to get any good news we could at this point. Our next step is to get those results back from the amniocentesis regarding any chromosome defects. Please continue to pray that those all come back normal. That would be an excellent Christmas gift :-)

We'll send out another email once we receive those results and then we probably won't have much to update everyone on until the due date in April.

Thanks again for your prayers. We really feel encouraged with all of your support.

December 21, 2007
Hey Everyone,

Just wanted to pass along some good news we got at the doctor's office yesterday. We received the results of the amniocentesis back and our boy has normal chromosomes. Needless to say, we were both very excited and relieved by this news. I think we're both glad to know the extent of everything we're dealing with.

Thank you so much for your prayers. We feel that this news was definitely an answer to prayer as the risk of these chromosome abnormalities increases dramatically with the congenital diaphragmatic hernia.

Please continue to pray for the baby's lungs to develop over the next few months and that we hear a big loud cry when he's born.

We probably won't have too much to update everyone on until it gets closer to April and we plan a due date.

March 11, 2008
Friends and Family,

It's been awhile since our last update, but we have some news to pass along. We went into the doctor last Friday (33 weeks along) and was put on bed rest. She went back on Monday to take a test that determines whether she's at risk to deliver in the next week or two. This test came out positive. This means that she has a 50/50 chance of delivering in that time frame. For the baby, it'd be best if he can stay in the womb as long as possible (or til April 18th when they want to deliver him).

As far as the baby's condition, we found out that part of the small intestines are working their way into the upper chest. We knew this was a possibility, but it's of course best if nothing else moves up there. We still don't know much more about the lung development and won't know the extent of the development until he's born.

We has another appointment scheduled for Thursday to see if she's progressed any further. If she has, she may have some more restrictions placed on her. Either way, we're hoping that they'll allow her to go to a couple more appointments she has scheduled in the coming weeks to check in on the baby's condition.

Even though this has been a difficult few months, we know that we have a God who is walking through this with us every step of the way. We know that He is hearing all of our prayers and that with Him, all things are possible.

Thank you all for all of your support and we'll keep you updated in the coming weeks.

March 13, 2008
We just thought we'd update everyone on some news from today's doctor appointments. She was examined and is still at risk for pre-term labor. They allowed her to stay at home on bed rest as opposed to being hospitalized which is nice for now. She's at 34 weeks now and we're hoping to make it at least another 3 weeks.

We also went down to Dallas for a Fetal MRI scan. Courtney was a trooper and laid in the MRI machine for 40 minutes (in a very tight space!). Afterwards, we reviewed the results with a doctor. She told us that they could see some lung development in our baby. The right lung looks to be decently formed and the left lung (where the hernia actually is) shows a little development. The physician was encouraged that there was some lung development on the left side as some babies with this condition don't have any formation at all. Overall, she gave us a "good prognosis for survival outside of the womb." She also mentioned that the longer he stays in the womb the better chance he has to develop his lungs further.

Needless to say, this is some of the best news we've heard in awhile! Thank God!

Thank you all so much for your prayers. We appreciate that more than you know. We also thank everyone who has been so kind to email or call with words of encouragement.

Please continue to pray for Courtney as she's still at risk to deliver early as well as for our baby's lungs to continue development.