Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Remembering Baby Sims (edit)

Belated Update: In late May, we found out from our doctor the "Baby Sarah" was actually a boy! We were in shock and still have a hard time thinking of "her" as "him". We believe the mistake was made because his cystic hygroma is more common in girls, and also,because he stopped growing at 16 weeks and had edema, it was hard to determine the sex. When I asked the doctor after delivery if it was a girl like the ultrasound tech had thought, he said,"I think so." It didn't occur to me to pursue the issue anymore. But when our (different) doctor was reading the autopsy in May, she called "her" a "male fetus" and surprised us! So, of course, we have changed his name. We chose Sims because it is Alex's mother's maiden name and my mother's grandfather was called "Sim". Currently, we do have a baby girl and she is moving in my belly! She has been doing so since I was 17.5 weeks pregnant. This is important because since we lost Sims at 18 weeks, I was dreading that time of my pregnancy. I was going to be afraid of losing this one, too, and didn't have a doctor's appointment for several weeks. But the Lord comforted me with those kicks, so I did not worry about her health.
Original Post:
We have been looking forward to Jan. 14th as the day we would find out we were having a little girl and see her moving in my belly. I was planning to post the pictures here and on Facebook to show her off. But, unfortunately she went to be with the Lord a few weeks ago, and was delivered on Jan. 5th after 18 weeks in utero. Even though her life was extremely short, we believe the Lord had a purpose for her and that her life was meaningful. We want to remember Sarah here on our Blog as one of our children-- one that we will get to meet for the first time in Heaven. This our only picture- from my 9 week appointment.
Sarah was named by Alex's mother. We had not come up with a name yet, and Ellen said, "Well I've been calling her Sarah." So Sarah it is. She was 8 inches long. Although we do not have a diagnosis yet, we believe Sarah may have had Turner's Syndrome. While this loss has certainly been devastating, we feel the comfort of the Lord as we know he knitted Sarah in my womb with purpose and loves her even more than we do. We feel so blessed by the love, support and prayers of our family, friends, friends of family, and the compassionate doctors and nurses at St. Francis.