Julia held captive at the hospital... she didn't get to come home.

Newsflash: Baby held captive at hospital because she was too cute to send home! (Yah, I'm kidding... but I'm not really smiling.)

Julia did not get to come home today like we thought she would (or like the doctor’s thought she would. Her discharge summary was already typed up when we got to the hospital.)

What happened? Her O2 sats (the oxygen levels/saturation in her blood) have been trending down this week and her breathing was more labored today. When we arrived, her sats were at an all time low in 3 weeks. (For those who know about sats, her sats were in the low 80s and dipping down into the high 70s. With her average sats around 85. Last week and even earlier this week they were in the 90s.) It is okay for Julia to have slightly lower sats than a healthy person because of her heart defect, but these are too low. We were “ready to go.” This is obviously very disappointing on many levels: 1) to not have her home when we thought she would be and 2) that she's not getting better... or that she DID get better, but then had a setback. I'm exhausted and very sick of this hospital thing. I hate seeing my little girl struggle. Bob is weary, too. Tomorrow she will be 10 weeks old. She has spent 7 out of the 10 weeks of her life in the hospital. I’ve started to wonder if Julia really likes the hospital… yah, I don’t think so. I do know that the staff at LPCH loves her. Every nurse comments about how cute she is. (They are right!) I think they are all rooting for her. I know they can see how much Bob and I love her and want her better and to come home!

Please pray for her and for us. This (Julia's health) has been so much harder and worse than I expected it would be. I never expected Julia would have to spend so much time in the hospital. I know this was unexpected for the doctors, too. We could not have predicted for her to have a second heart issue. She was strong when she was first born. Things looked very straightforward. Now they are not. She is and has been an enigma medically speaking. (Where’s Dr. House when you need him? Haha)

Please pray for endurance. It is like we signed up for a 5K run (which is about the max that I can run!) and instead, it got extended to a 100K ultramarathon at the 2-mile marker. It just seems endless and overwhelming. We’re already pooped. How are we supposed to keep going indefinitely? I know Bob and I don’t have the strength within ourselves to do it. We will have to rely on God. However, this is easier said than done. Even though I WANT to rely on God, the bottom line is that I don’t want a life that *requires* me to rely on Him. I want to rely on Him on my terms. That’s not the way it works. That sucks. Suffering sucks (I think I need to make that a bumper sticker.) All I can do is put one foot in front of the other and trust God that I will have the strength to take another step after that one. I know He can carry me (like the famous Footprints poem.) The question is, will I let Him?