Naomi At 5 Weeks—Barely Holding On

by | May 11, 2015 | Naomi Grace

Our dear family and friends,

Today is Naomi’s 5 week birthday. Sadly, this past week she has had some major setbacks, and the past 24 hours have been especially bad. Due to a leaky feeding tube and other problems she has lost a lot of weight over the last number of days, and now weighs less than she did when she was born. This is a big problem, since her weight is a foundational indicator of her overall health. The longer she stays small, the less we can do for her.

But perhaps even worse is the change in her respiratory state. As of last night her lungs were not inflating properly (if at all), so her respirator pressure settings were dialed up a notch. But that simply caused her left lung to over-inflate, pushing her heart and right lung out of place. Her settings have since been returned to where they were before, but unless something changes for the better, this will likely not help much. It may be that there is no longer a respirator setting that will work for her; if that is the case, we will soon be unable to help her breathe on her own.

No one knows for sure, but both Jen and I feel that Naomi may be nearing the end of her journey here on earth. We are leaning hard on God for strength and grace, and trusting that He will give us wisdom and help us make the right decisions. But that does not mean that we are not also sad and scared. On the contrary, if not for Jesus, we would not be able to fully experience these emotions. God is good, and gives us the strength we need to be there for our daughter and our three boys.

Thank you for your prayers. May God be glorified in Naomi’s life, whether short or long! May her every breath be a song of praise to our Redeemer, her every heart-beat a testimony to His unfailing love. We are so grateful that He loves Naomi even more than we do: “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.” (Isaiah 49:15)

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