The Unthinkable: September 29, 2011

My parents arrived and that made the situation even harder, me seeing my parents had me thinking 'will Kherington ever see her's again.' Then having to go tell all my friends who were at the hospital waiting to see her was just as hard. They were down in the cafeteria laughing and having fun, they weren't expecting news like this. Nobody was!

The transport arrived and said they were loading Kherington up to prepare her for the car ride to CHKD and they would bring her by so we could see her before she left. When they brought her in the room she looked like a science experiment. She had a ton of wires and tubes connected to her and she was inside a plastic box, like an incubator. She was sedated, and they let us open the side door so we could hold her hand and let her know everything was going to be okay. They gave us her first picture that they took after her bath, wires and all.

I rode with my parents to CHKD because I was in no shape to drive a vehicle. I stared at the picture almost the entire way. I was sitting in the back seat and would occasionally stare out the window, just wondering if Kherington was ever going to get to enjoy this world that we all complain about so much.

We get to CHKD with all my friends behind us. They all came with me and would stay with me until the middle of the morning, and most of them had to work the next day. That meant so much to me, to know that I had that much support from family and friends was unbelievable. After Kherington arrived at CHKD they told us that it would be a couple of hours until I would get to see her because they had to get everything hooked up and get her stable. Two hours seemed like an eternity, I don't care how many people you have there to distract you from the present. You might for one second get to take your mind off of reality but then in a blink of an eye it always comes back.

I would sit there and zone out at times. Everybody talking around me and I heard nothing. I would just sit there and think about if I would ever get to hold my daughter again. I got to hold her for five minutes and I couldn't even remember those five minutes. I thought about if I would ever get to kick the soccer ball around in the front yard or play with barbies or build forts in the dining room with chairs, blankets, and pillows. I just didn't understand why this was happening.

I finally got the call that I could go see my baby girl. When I walked in it was an experience in itself. There were eight stations all with babies in plastic boxes. One of the saddest places I have ever been too. I had to scrub my arms with soap all the way up to elbows, and then use 2 squirts of hand sanitizer on each arm up to the elbow before I could enter. Then I had to put on a full upper body scrub along with a surgical mouth cover thingy. When I finally got to go see Kherington she looked even more like a science experiment. She had more tubes and hoses than before along with four different monitors hooked up to her. It was just awful.

I was in there for about four hours while my mom, dad, sister, and Kherington's Godfather, Stoney, all took turns coming in to see her. They only allow two people at her bedside at a time. After everyone had their turn to come see Kherington I stayed for a little bit longer and had some alone time with her. I just stared at her and prayed. I felt like a bad father because there was nothing I could do, and that is my job as a father is to protect her from everything!

While I was there alone the doctor came by and spoke with me. He really gave me the worse news I could have possibly wanted, but then again I asked him to tell me the truth and forget about that bedside manner bull crap. He said that they were giving her a plasma transplant to help with the bleeding in her lung, and hoping that it would clot by itself. He then said the problem is if that hole in her lung were to clot, the blood still left in her lung is too deep for them to suck out with a tube. He then explained, the problem with blood sitting in her lung is that our lungs have a chemical that it produces which keeps our lungs moist and open. With the blood just sitting in her lung it can soak up that chemical and her lungs can dry out causing her to not being able to breathe. When this happens there is a synthetic form of this chemical called surfactin that they can inject into her lungs to stop them from drying and closing. The problem is that this chemical would most likely knock the clot out and she would start bleeding into her lung again, and by knocking that clot out, it could cause the hole to become larger, causing her to bleed even more into her lung. He said that if she doesn't need the surfactin by noon tomorrow then he thinks she will be fine because that means the bleeding would have stopped by then and the blood left in her lung wouldn't be enough to cause problems. So I looked at the doctor and said, "So you are telling me that if she can get to noon tomorrow she will be fine, if not she will either suffocate to death or she will drown in her own blood." The doctor really didn't say anything because I was right. Try going back to your family and friends and telling them that.

I went back to the room where it got dead quiet when I walked in. Before I said anything about Kherington I asked, "Did the Cardinals win?" Which everyone said yes, so I had a bitter sweet moment. Then I explained the scenario that was happening. Telling your loved ones that news without breaking down is the hardest thing I have ever done. Seeing every one's face when saying that, and seeing their expressions, was heart breaking. I still don't know how I held it together.

Ashley was still at the hospital where she had to stay overnight. I called her and told her I got to see Kherington but didn't tell her what the doctor and I had talked about. She needed to get rest and get better and I didn't need her ripping needles and tubes out of her arm screaming at the doctors and nurses to let her leave. So I lied to her, but it was the right thing to do. She will hate me for it later, but I think she will also thank me.

It was about 2 o'clock in the morning when everyone started to head home. The nurse had just come in and told us that Kherington's blood test came back and her plasma levels were up, which was a good sign for the clotting issue. So since we got good news I think some people wanted to end on that note. My friend Jake actually stayed with me that night. They don't have rooms for you to sleep in at CHKD but I talked to the nurse and told her I wasn't leaving. She was nice enough to put me in one of the breast pumping rooms that had fold down chairs. They were harder than the floor, but after all I had been through I was exhausted and was asleep before I hit the pillow. She had told us that we had to be out by 8am since that is when they open the rooms for ladies to pump. Last thing I think a lady wants to do is walk into a room she thinks she is going to be pumping in and two guys are asleep in both chairs.

So my alarm went off at 7am...

The Induction: September 27th, 2011

Ashley had an OBGYN appointment today and prior to this day we had debated on whether Ashley wanted to get induced today, but after taking the baby classes Ashley didn't want to be induced anymore because she learned that her contractions are more painful when induced. So she changed her mind. Ashley called me during her appointment and told me that the doctor had a hard time finding the heart beat and that he said it was very weird and that he wanted to go ahead and induce her. I told Ashley that the doctor wants her to be induced so she goes into labor on his schedule and not at 2 o'clock in the morning on a Sunday or something and that if something was wrong he wouldn't have given you the option to be induced. But of course I was supportive and told Ashley if that is what she wanted to do then I am OK with that. So she told the doctor she did want to be induced today. The doctor said they would have to call the hospital to see if they have a room available and they would give us a call to let us know.

So now here I am at work and it's starting to kick in that this is it, the time has come. The past nine months have finally led to this moment. I couldn't work anymore, my mind was so far gone, I just wanted to go home, but we hadn't even gotten the word if she was even going to be induced yet.

Ashley calls me within the hour to tell me that the hospital does not have any rooms. Well there goes all that excitement!

After I got off work, I come home to my still very pregnant fiance and we are just sitting and talking about how excited we were and now we don't want to wait anymore. Then Ashley gets a phone call and it is the hospital. They told Ashley that someone cancelled their induction and wanted to know if she still wanted to get induced tonight. We of course say yes because we are so impatient!

So we had to be at the hospital between 8 P.M. and 9 P.M. When we got there the registration desk person said to us, "Well let me make sure we still have a room for you. We got a lot of emergencies since we called you." Here I am thinking, "I swear if they send us back home I am going to cause a scene! I am not getting this close to be turned away!" I felt like I was standing in line for a premiere event and only the first 100 people get in, and every time I counted the people in front of me we were numbers 101 and 102. They tell us to go sit in the waiting room and they will let us know. I've already sent out numerous mass texts telling people this was happening. You can't take back that kind of information. You can't send a, "Sike!" text. Luckily for the people working that night they got us a room, because if they hadn't I might of missed my daughter's birth for being banned from the hospital.

They started the induction process at 11 P.M. and said that she would start feeling minor contractions sometime tomorrow morning. So I grabbed a blanket, tried to figure out how to make that chair extend out to a bed. Couldn't figure it out, so I just pulled up another chair and slept on two chairs. See you in the morning!

Tip #41: Get induced, it's less stress, no rushing to the hospital, no ruining of your car's interior, and it's just calmer.

And this is when the "Please Fasten Your Seat Belt" sign came on on my journey to, destination... dad.

The Tour: July 31, 2011

Before you go to the hospital for the birth of your child you are supposed to take a tour of the hospital. Why? I am not exactly sure and after our "tour" I still haven't figured out why.

We arrive at the hospital and are sitting in the lobby waiting for our tour guide to come get us. Well while we are sitting there two more couples come to the lobby to wait for the tour guide as well. One is a Mexican couple and we later find out that they don't speak any English because when the tour guide ask them what they are having the guy nods his head and says, "Si." The other couple, who just so happened to sit across from us in the lobby, decides she wants to try and talk to Ashley. The problem is she talks like she has rocks in her mouth and she was very hard to understand. I was reading a magazine at the time she spoke and I decided to bury my face into the magazine to stop from laughing. I'm not trying to be mean but do you know what it is like to try to talk to someone when you don't have the slightest clue as to what they are saying. If you don't just ask Ashley because she now knows what it's like.

The magazine I was reading was Popular Science and the article I was reading about is how we, humans, use good memories and thoughts to predict the future when making decisions. Meaning when we are faced with a decision in life we tend to think about what good has happened or what good can happen before deciding. We tend to block out the negative that we know or think could happen and weigh the positive much more than the negative, helping us make our decision. So we tend to think the positive prediction will be the result of our decision. So here I am sitting there reading this article and I started to think, maybe God is trying to give me a sign. When Ashley and I decided to try for a baby I was all for it. I helped raise my niece and have seen a child grow up, and it is an amazing and unforgettable journey. I remember when she first started to roll over, or crawl, or walk, talk, laugh, cry, show her personality, I remember everything! Or at least I thought I did. While reading this article it made me think about those years that my niece was growing up, and it made me think deeper, and then it hit me. When talking to Ashley about trying for a baby I was all for it because those things I just listed along with others is what all I thought about and those are the things that I wanted to cherish with a child of my own. I didn't think about the crying in the middle of the night, the temper tantrums, the crying for hours and you don't know why, the spills, the stains, the puke, or the poop along with many, many other things. I felt like God was talking to me throughout that article. But before I could get down on my knees and start talking to him, begging him for my child to have nothing but good memories, the tour guide arrived.

As we start to walk around the hotel with the tour guide she would ask a question to the group but Ashley and I were the only ones that responded. So from then on she just decided to talk to only us since we appeared to be the only normal couple in the group. I had asked Ashley if she signed us up for the handicap tour and then received a backhand to the chest. The tour guide took us to the delivery and post-partum room where I first checked out the TVs in each room. I calculated the size, looked at the wall mount and if it was on a swivel, checked out the lighting in the room, and decided where I would be sitting to get the best viewing experience. I then leaned over and asked Ashley, "Do you think they have NFL Sunday Ticket here?" and again received another backhand to the chest. How could you blame me? Ashley's due date is on a Sunday, one month into the football season, I can't miss my fantasy players games that day!

So after the completion of the tour we got to see every room that Ashley and Kherington will be in along with instructions and directions around the hospital. Now do they really think I or any other man will be able to remember all the things they just told us? Do you understand how big this hospital is? Every hallway and door looks the same, it's like she was giving birth inside one of those carnival fun houses with all the mirrors. Just tell me what to do and where to go when I get there. Thanks.

Tip #31: Be the guy who brings a notepad and paper to the tour. I really wish I did.

And this is when I realized that right before my plane is scheduled to land, all hell is going to break loose on my journey to, destination... dad.