World View

After reading all of your comments over the past few days, I wish I could sit down and talk to each one of you face to face, especially those of you who ate all of my Christmas candy. The break room is a privilege, my friends, not a right.

I witnessed an event the other day that blew away my previous parenting world view. As you know, we've been praying that Benjamin would someday be able to drink milk; well there he was in his new crib with a tube in one nostril happily drinking milk through his nose. That was not in any of the parenting books I read, and I want my money back. God certainly has a sense of humor when he answers our prayers. Unfortunately, Ben's tummy hasn't handled the milk too well up to this point. I find it strange that the law of physics which claims that matter cannot be created or destroyed does not apply when feeding milk to an infant. The way I see it, at least three times the amount of milk that is fed to the baby comes back up the other way. I'm sure there are some useful scientific applications we can derive from this principle, but I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.

Benjamin also had his first official weigh-in yesterday. He can now officially be considered a NICU super-heavyweight at 8 pounds 14 ounces. Apparently Ben shares his father's love of the late night snack while no one is looking. I have requested that the chips and salsa be removed from the NICU kitchen until further notice (for his sake and mine).

Some of you have been asking that more pictures be posted. Your wish is my command - eventually. Today Ben had his first professional photo shoot done by Jenny Connell, a friend of ours from Memorial Drive. She does great work; if any of you in the Tulsa area ever want incredible pictures of your newborn baby, she's the one to go to. As soon as we get them, I'll put some out there for all of you.

I've let this go too long, but I want to give a huge thank you to all of our brothers and sisters at Memorial Drive Church of Christ. We showed up on Sunday, and you poured out your love on us until our empty tanks were full again. So many of you knew exactly what to say to encourage us, and it was just another reminder of why we fell in love with all of you in the first place. You have taken care of our food and transportation needs, and you have built us up so we can face the challenges of the week ahead. You are the hands and feet of Jesus to us.

I'd also like to brag on our preacher, Terry Rush, who has preached several sermons that have prepared us for the storm we are in. In one of these sermons, Terry challenged us to imagine how we would deal with tragedy in our own lives after several people in our congregation passed away within a short time of each other. He didn't want this to be a morbid exercise, but he wanted us to envision ourselves doing things God's way even under terrible circumstances. I imagined losing both Adrienne and Benjamin during Ben's delivery. I saw myself disappearing into my bedroom at the house and not coming out for months, not talking to anyone, not doing anything. This exercise made me realize that I didn't want to end up like that if something bad happened. God deserves better than that from me. Thankfully, that worst nightmare has not occurred, and we can rest in your arms as we deal with the frustration of not being able to take our baby home. Thank you Terry for preparing us for this, and thank you church family all over the world for not letting us silently disappear when trouble came our way.

May you have the same peace that you give us,
Whit, Adrienne, and Benjamin