to Him be the glory

I have felt God tugging on my heart to blog….& to do it in order to glorify Him. And the best way I know how to do that is to share our story - one about a medical momma that loves her kiddos with all her heart & how God strengthens me & humbles me each & every day.

So in order to do that I need to tell Sage’s story. Not that we weren’t following Christ as a family before Sage was sick, but to show how God has worked in our lives since that fateful time.

Here goes….if you want the full account of everything that happened with Sage you can read our CaringBridge site.

On Friday, January 29th, Sage wasn't really eating & had turned very pale, so we rushed him to his pediatrician & then onto Community South ER. He was treated for sepsis & some sort of bacterial infection & we were transported via Lifeline to Riley, where Sage stayed 37 days in the PICU with bacterial meningitis caused by group b strep.

Backstory - Sage didn't sleep well through the night - worse than usual. He was really grunting & crying out. He ate regular around 6am & 9am - after that, things started to take a turn, which in the beginning we thought was just fussiness from his tongue tie procedure. He seemed hungry around 10am because he was fussy, but he wouldn't eat much. He actually ended up spitting up a lot of that bottle, so he wouldn't stop crying from 9am-11am - nothing helped. We went back & forth on calling the pediatrician & finally around 1pm we decided we should call because he was starting to look really pale. She NEVER has openings, but she did 40 minutes later so we loaded up & went - ONLY GOD.

The doctor didn't like his color so she had his hemoglobin checked. It came back fine so she wasn't sure whether to send us home to monitor him after some X-rays of his stomach or straight to the ER. After I tried to feed him again & he wouldn't do it, she sent us straight to the ER.

We got to the hospital around 3pm. Only one parent could go back with him due to COVID, so I stayed & Zach waited in the car. They pretty much started the work up on him the moment we got back there because they could tell how sick he was. They got an IV in, started fluid, antibiotic, & antiviral. They also did some blood draws & cultures because they thought it was sepsis/infection right away - praise God for their quick action! That all of course scared me so much to not know what was wrong. I kept him swaddled up next to me. 

They wanted to do a lumbar puncture which terrified us. They reassured us it was normal protocol for a critically ill infant. They took me down the hall tow hit & I just hit my knees & prayed for God to save him. They came back down & told me they weren't able to do it because his heart rate & blood pressure dropped. After a while they told us we were being transferred to Riley....

When the Lifeline team arrived, I was shaking I was so nervous. They were incredible. So thorough & calming. I know now that God was right there in the room with us. They ran a couple tests on him to know how to situate him in the ambulance. They did also tell me due to COVID I couldn't ride with him in the ambulance....but they explained how it would all work - no lights/sirens, where to park, etc. Zach & I followed the ambulance up to Riley & we made the decision that I would stay with him & we would switch in the morning. We got to Riley around 8pm...

The next 5 hours were a blur & time stood still at the same time. I got up to the floor he was on & had to wait in the waiting room till they called me in. Then the fellow came out to talk to me - for the 1st time I was truly scared of what he was telling me. It was like something out of a movie - so surreal. He said "he's very sick & I don't know really what to tell you at the moment..." They ordered a CT scan of the brain, chest X-ray, abdomen ultrasound & all the labs/blood draws. It seemed like so much but he also explained that with newborns you have to check for it all because they can't tell you what's wrong. So after crying with him, they finally came & took me back - it was so hard to see him hooked up to everything. 

It was about 9pm & I met our night nurse outside the room. She wanted me to put a gown on which I questioned. She told me they swabbed him for COVID, which I explained we already had it & weren't contagious, but we got labeled a COVID room anyway, so we had to wear gloves & a gown the whole time. His test came back positive (which we knew it would) but it also came back with antibodies. 

From then on, it was a lot of meds getting pushed in, IV draws, just a lot of commotion. This went on for the next few hours to get him stable. It killed me to see him with so many things attached to him. He had a hi-flow oxygen mask on, but he started getting startled & stiffening up. So they decided to be safe they would put on EEG monitors on his head to look for seizures. That process took almost 45 minutes to do & this was around 1am. In the meantime, the doc said the X-ray & ultrasound came back clear, as did the CT scan - praise God!

Around 2am the docs came in & decided to be safe, they would intubate him, mainly to keep him calm during the lumbar puncture they needed to do for spinal cultures. I went down the hall while they did the procedure. The doctor came in at one point & told me they needed to start some blood pressure medicine because it dropped during intubation. By 6am, everything was in place & he was much more relaxed. 

That story was almost 10 months ago & I feel like I relive it every time I read it. Since then we have poured our lives into learning a new routine of a medical family, countless therapies, pretty much rerouting our lives to ensure we are giving Sage what he needs. All while trying to keep Mara’s life somewhat intact & normal.

We often say, “how would people do this without God?” I truly don’t know how its possible. He has strengthened us with no sleep. He has given us peace with difficult test results. He has given us discernment in making decisions for both kids. He has truly been the foundation on which our home has withstood the storm.

We know it will be a long road to recovery for baby Sage, but our God never fails and He won't fail us now. Sage is a strong boy & we can feel each & every one of your prayers - even 10 months out from when he was first hospitalized. Keep them coming!

We may never know how he got this sick, but we do know we acted quickly. And we do know this - that God works all things for good, even through insurmountable trials like your child being very sick. We are clinging onto the hope we have in Jesus to get us & baby Sage through.

The verse that has resonated with us as we've prayed over Sage is Isaiah 41:10 "Fear not, for I am with you. Do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, I will help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”

So we will keep praying. Every. Single. Day.