Abundantly blessed.

The morning after the last post I made (elf yourself of all things!), our lives were changed forever. Our newest addition made an early showing (3 weeks early!) after a very scary series of events.

I was in a car accident Friday morning, December 11th, on my way to my 37 week OB appointment. I am embarrassed and ashamed to say I fell asleep at the wheel. Carter was with me and we were south bound on 288. I veered off the left side of the road and hit the barrels in front of a concrete column support of an overpass going approx 40-50 mph. After the initial impact, the car ricocheted back across all four lanes of the highway before hitting the concrete retaining wall on the opposite side of the highway where we finally came to a stop. We truly were being watched over by guardian angels. Any one of a million things could have happened in those split seconds to have made the outcome very different, but as it was Carter and I walked away without a scratch and no other vehicles were hit.

We were taken to Memorial Herman by EMS just as a precaution. Carter was immediately given the green light to go home, but because I was pregnant they wanted to admit me for observation since a potentially fatal complication can occur after an abdominal trauma called placental abruption. It is where the placenta separates from the uterus causing blood loss to baby, mom or both. While baby Jack appeared to be fine, the doctors all agreed that since he was 37 weeks, he needed to come on out.

They began the induction Friday evening around 6pm, and despite a slow start, baby Jack arrived safe and sound at 1am on 12/12/2009.

It turned out I had developed a mild abruption...about 15 percent of my placenta separated from my uterus, so I am very grateful that my doctors talked me into the induction because I was initially against it.

We have been so abundantly blessed throughout this process...I cannot begin to thank our friends and family enough for their prayers and support. We were fortunate to have my mom as well as Stephen's parents available the weekend of Jack's arrival to watch Carter and prepare our very messy house for our baby boy's homecoming. They even washed the bassinet and dug out all the baby clothes that were still in Tupperware bins and washed them so Jack would have something to wear when he arrived home!

Our homecoming was so special. My sister-in-law and her fiance were even able to come in town for the afternoon. We just have the most amazing family. Even the people that couldn't be there were so supportive and sent their love.

As hard as it was to let her take him, Mom took Carter home with her and we were blessed to have dinners brought over during our first week on our own so that we could just focus on feeding Jack since it was initially an around-the-clock job. As a sleeply late pre-term baby, it took him almost an hour and a half to eat in the beginning and he needed to be fed every 2 hours. Luckily, it's only taking him about 45 minutes to eat these days and the time between feedings has stretched closer and closer to the 3 hour mark (though we are not quite there yet).

I just can't begin to put into words how blessed our little family has been this holiday. Despite the circumstances, Jack's arrival was miraculous and the love and support of our family and friends has just been overwhelming.

Our love and thanks to all of you this holiday season and always,
The Childress Family