Thursday, April 18, 2013

Counting Our Blessings Instead of Fingers & Toes



It was a scary sight as a new mother.  I remember lying in the hospital bed after having just delivered our second son, Marco.  As the doctors are dealing with my afterbirth I look over to my husband on the other side of the room with my nurse who's dealing with the regular baby work.   

Joe looks over at me as he sees me observing what's going on.  He has a new dad look of Joy on his face and says, "babe he's beautiful...he has 10 fingers and toes".   Then I see him turn back to the nurse and baby and have a quite different look in his face.  One of more worry.  I hear him ask "is that normal?"  I'm getting a little nervous myself now as I can feel his internal struggle of trying to keep it together whilst also wondering how he's going to "break the news" to me. I ask if everything is ok and his response. "95%".   What does that mean?

Our son Marco was born with a hand Deformity known as Syndactyly.  We will know better after some appointments and x-ray tests we have coming up. Basically he has a pinky finger, but the other fingers are fused together to form what looks like one.  At the moment we don't know what could have caused this other than just the sheer miracle of life process and all the cell generation that happens as a part of it....somewhere along that process his fingers just never separated perhaps.....

Looking back .... all those ultrasounds....and we never noticed.  Nor did anyone point it out. (I had several ultrasounds and we even did a 3D one!).  And all the times we as expecting parents say "he has all his fingers and toes....I'm happy" or "as long as he has all his fingers and toes".  I can't help myself but relook at this and now and say "so what?"   So what if we had known or now that we know.  Does it change anything?   Absolutely not!  "So what" if he only has visually 7 fingers?   Does it make him less loved?    Absolutely not!

I want to share the email I sent out to our family and friends when we shared the news about Marcos arrival and what we call "his special hand".  I've had an overwhelming positive response  to it. Perhaps cause I wrote it in 5 minutes strait from my heart as fresh new mom of 2, hormonal, tired and bitterly honest. 

Perhaps this will shed some light on our love for our child who turned out to not have all his fingers and toes.  Perhaps you'll think again about using this phase when referring to a newborn or expecting baby :)

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Marco DAY 3 UPDATE and Info re: His SPECIAL HAND :)



Hello Family and Friends!

First of all we wanted to say a really REALLY big THANK YOU for everyone's love and support and encouragement throughout the entire pregnancy, the labour and what turned out to be a very FAST delivery.  We wanted everyone to know that Marco, Mommy, Daddy and Jonathan are all doing really REALLY well and we are enjoying day 3 now that we are home from the hospital as a family of 4.  Marco is truly an angel and really just such a good baby.  He's beautiful, happy and healthy...Latching really well.... popping like crazy and gives really awesome cuddles :)    What more could we pray for?

With that said, there is something that we wanted to share with you all.  We did have a little "surprise" and I suppose you can say it's going to be a little "challenge" that we will have to deal with.  It looks like Marco was born with a Hand Deformity possibly known as Syndactyly.  We will know better after some appointments and x-ray tests we have coming up. Basically he has a pinky finger, but the other fingers are fused together to form what looks like one.  At the moment we don't know what could have caused this other than just the sheer miracle of life process and all the cell generation that happens as a part of it....somewhere along that process his fingers just never separated perhaps......
Undoubtedly we will have a little journey ahead of us in terms of getting more information on it, probably speaking to a multitude of different specialists etc.; however we wanted everyone to know that Marco is a completely (...and for lack of a better word....) "normal" baby.  We love him to death.  He is in no way in pain.  He has full functionality of his hand and the "two fingers" that he was blessed to be given.  The hardest part at the moment for all of us is just going to be getting over the "esthetics" of the hand itself and possibly different functionality.  Rest assured, we are being told that this is actually quite common and that there are a ton a options for us to explore on this.  Knowing our family, we will be ALL OVER the research and options :)  And we've been so blessed with so many great family and friends that we are sure you will all be there to love and support us through it too.
We trust that you will keep Marco and us in your prayers.  We are so excited for you all to meet him.  Please PLEASE PLEASE do not worry about US or HIM.  We are all TOTALLY fine over here.  We really appreciate your love and support through this.  We weren't sure the best way to handle sharing this information; however after much thought we figured it would be best to just put the information out there so that everyone can ask any questions they might have (...and possibly share any information, contacts, resources you have found too!).   Please feel free to ask us anything, touch him, hold him, love him, hold his hand...explore.....  He's a BEAUTIFUL baby boy (he looks exactly like his big brother Jonathan ;)
Looking forward to seeing you all with our new bundle of joy!
xoxox  The Berenguers
Marco Joseph Berenguer
Weighing 7lbs, 8onz
Born April 12, 2013 at 6:42am

For this child we have prayed and the LORD has granted the desires of our heart. 1 Samuel 1:27