our baby

We are naming our baby David Samuel. David--because his big brother Jonathan always wanted a brother named David. In Heaven, we hope they will experience a heavenly version of the kind of bond that King David and his closest friend Jonathan shared on earth. His middle name is Samuel because we know the Lord will be taking him Home either during pregnancy or just after birth. Therefore we are giving him to the Lord, knowing he will serve our King, just as the prophet Samuel ministered in the temple after his mother Hannah dedicated him to the Lord.

David has a constellation of symptoms consistent with Trisomy 13, the most notable of which is a 2-chambered heart. Babies with Trisomy 13 rarely make it to their first birthday, and most die sometime during the last trimester of pregnancy. With David's severe heart condition, we know what we are facing. Each day with him is a gift. I will have the privilege of carrying him until--in the blink of an eye--he will be taken home to Heaven. We are heartbroken that we will never know him in this life the way we know our other children. I have wept buckets of tears over all the unlived moments we will never share with him. I pray that the moment he passes into the arms of Jesus he will also be embraced and held by my Granna until I one day go home as well. Maybe she can keep singing him the lullabies where Rebecca and I left off...