Day 32 - support life - life support.

by becky


I grew up in a home where the value of life was taught and modeled every day. Such as caring for elderly grandparents, or giving a home to a pregnant teen, volunteering as a family in a pro-life demonstration, and my parents adopting my two sisters. I am thankful for all of this and how it has impacted my life.
I was 24-That's the day we were challenged about the value of life. We had been married for a few years and had a little girl who was 18 months. On May 28, 2005, our world changed. I gave birth to our second daughter- Kelly Hadassah. She was only 2 pounds and not breathing on her own. When she was three days old, the doctor came and explained to us that she had a chromosome disorder called trisomy 18 (also known as Edward's syndrome).

I remember my dear husband asking "this won't affect how you treat her will it?" The doctor responded by recommending that we take her off of life support right away. She will have no quality of life he said, won't walk or talk. But who are we to decide which life is valuable, which life is worthy of love and of fighting for? We strongly believe that God is the author of life, and the one who numbers our days. We did not feel that that was our decision to make.

We never thought that we would make good parents for a handicapped child. But here we were praying that ours would live. We found ourselves stopping to talk with other peoples' children with severe handicaps, smiling at them, hoping that someday, someone would do the same for our daughter.
And so began the ten weeks of our tiny little girls' life.  Each day we sat with her, holding her when we could, singing to her, praying for her, hoping and grieving each day. My mom made her special little doll clothes. She was the only NICU baby who wore dresses everyday! We found that as we treated her so special, doing all the things we would have done for a healthy baby, that the nurses also started to change how they treated her, doing special little things for her too.
We were not the only families with tiny sick babies there. I was amazed at how young some of the babies were who survived. Some were only 1 pound, and only 24 weeks. But they were very real. They had heart beats and fingernails, and NAMES! Here in this room the doctors and nurses did everything they could to save those little lives. On another floor of the hospital those same babies could be aborted as "tissue".
Please, remember that every life is unique and valued by God.

**********************************************************************

To read more of Becky's incredible story, click HERE.