-OH MY GOODNESS, I made it through a year -By Will

A year ago today is probably the most bittersweet day of my life. At 5:02am September 6, 2012, Mayla Grace Ellis was born into the world. I have to imagine that most parents would say, the day their children were born was the best day of their lives. Well, the day I married Keri was a pretty solid day too, and I would probably put that up at the top. The day Mayla was born, while being incredibly exciting and joy-filled, it was also very scary, stressful and stress-filled, and painful. Here was a day that we had longed for, for a long time. You see, Keri and I (mostly Keri but I had a role too) were first pregnant in September of 2011. We had spent a lot of time praying about when to begin trying, also endured mucho harassment at the hands of some great people who seem to think “the more, the merrier, and sooner” (just kidding, love you guys, and you know who you are), and sensed August 2011 was our “go time”. Sadly, we lost that baby at the end of October. Nobody knew we were pregnant or even trying. Despite our loss and pain, we knew there would be a plan in it and sensed the Lord telling us to get back on the proverbial “horse” and go again. So we did and before we left to go back to Switzerland, we announced to our families only that we were pregnant. This was December 31, 2011 and our decision to share was based on the request for prayer for the safety of our baby, Keri, me (little did I know that I’d need more prayer than the other two put together), and the next nine months (little did we know we would need more prayer in months 10-22 than ever before).

So back to September 6, 2012. I remember the day very clearly and while I won’t go back to it to give you all the details, I will if you REALLY want to know them, I will say that the day was a complete whirlwind. And by whirlwind, I mean everything and everyone around me was “whirlwinding” around and I was just standing there like a bonehead not comprehending what was going on. Everything that happened in that delivery happened so fast, except Mayla actually coming out of course, that I didn’t have the opportunity to take it all in, to enjoy the experience, to understand what was happening. So I’ll break this down for you:

• Mayla comes out
• She is thrown, and I mean thrown, onto Keri’s chest
• I’m jerked over to cut the cord, and I mean jerked (hey big tall slow guy, you notice a pattern here??? Uhhhhh)
• I cut the cord, vaguely remember that experience because it was soo fast
• Mayla is taken from Keri to be cleaned up and “stuff”
• Mayla is given back to Keri
• Attending pediatric doc runs out of the room to get an oxygen machine
• Doc runs back in with oxygen, gone for probably seconds, and grabs Mayla back
• Keri says something to the effect of “something is wrong, go talk to her, take pictures, pray over her”

So I do that, but I’m super confused about what’s going on. The books didn’t tell me about this. I’m supposed to be celebrating, smoking cigars, cheering, clapping, crying, balloons, confetti, happy (where was the happy???). Instead of what the books gave us to expect, we got fear, lack of understanding, worry, wonder.

Minutes later, though seemed like a long time, the said Mayla wasn’t getting enough oxygen and they needed to take her to neo-natal for observation. Pardon my selfishness, but I hadn’t even touched her yet and Keri held her for just a minute or two, if that. By the time the doctor had finished with Keri, Mayla had already been moved via big plastic box to neo-natal and neither of us had placed eyes on her for more than 5 minutes. Then Keri and I were alone. We prayed, cried, prayed, and cried before the doctors came back in. That was a creepy moment because it was exactly what I would expect from a movie: the massive door swings open slowly (slow motion like), both doctors and the mid-wife come in, steps in sync, very serious looks on their face, and Keri and I are together at her bed, holding hands, praying, wondering. They tell us Mayla has an issue with her oxygen, she is not getting enough and they didn’t know why. They had already called the Children’s Hospital and were on their way to pick her up so they can run tests and figure out what was wrong. We were encouraged to go to neo-natal to see her, touch her, spend time with her, talk with her, take pictures, etc. Imagine, if you will, a handful of medical staff giving you this “encouragement” after the birth of your child… Not all that encouraging of encouragement, I don’t think so anyway. So we did, and we loved it. We cried, prayed, took pictures, touched her, loved her, then watched her be transported away, wondering if we would ever see her again.

You can probably guess that yes, we did see her again. The next three weeks at the Zürich Children’s Hospital were incredibly up and down. However, the show of love and support from our Zürich family eased the heartache and difficulties. We were so blessed by the outpouring; we’ll never have words enough to fully thank everyone who played a role. We left the hospital just three weeks after Mayla entered, went through two levels of intensive care, a round in neo-natal, open heart surgery, back to ICU, and back to neo-natal. The joy we had when we finally brought Mayla home is indescribable.

The following weeks were the most challenging of our lives. You see, the hospital was easy. We show up in the morning, nurses tell us how the night went, what she’s on/off, plan for the day, if one exists, we go see Mayla, and spend our day in and out of the ICU / neo-natal seeing her. Sure we had some tough times there where Mayla wasn’t responding well to something, feeding well, just irritable, AWFUL diaper rash, etc, but at the end of the day, we had to leave her in the hands of the incredible nurses and doctors and go back to our dorm room for some needed sleep. At home however, it was us vs. the world.

I used to have this theory that God gave everyone “easy” first kids, as a way of sort of dooping them into having more. This became my theory because it seemed as though almost everybody I knew had “easy” first children. Well, if Mayla was the “easy” one, I’m throwing in the towel…

Don’t get me wrong, I love Mayla with everything I am and everything I can muster, everyday. But no amount of reading could have prepared me for what was coming. In fact, it seemed as though Mayla’s first weeks home would not have fit into any book’s description: scientific, spiritual, or otherwise. It was tough, for both of us, but more so for me. Mayla has taught me a lot over this last year, but those first weeks/months, I learned just how selfish I really am. The reality for me was, I had some things I was looking forward to as a first-time father and I feel like I missed out on a lot of the traditional “firsts” for first-time fathers, and I’ll never get them back. That being said however, I was able to experience so many other things that “first-time” fathers, and 2nd, 3rd, 4th, & 5th too, don’t get to experience that I’m all good with it.
I saw the Lord work miracles everyday. I witnessed a miraculous recovery. I experienced the outpouring of love, support, encouragement, nourishment, compassion, and more, of God’s people, to the extent that I had never seen before. I watched as doctor’s, nurses, and the like study Mayla in amazement at her recovery and how she has grown over this last year, baffled that, aside from her scar, that is no indication of a surgery ever taking place. I experienced the unconditional love and grace of a child who needed, wanted, and deserved a father to step up and do battle with the demons trying to keep him down. I have seen how one person’s smile, can change thousands of peoples day, in the matter of a split second. I witnessed miraculous changes each and everyday, in my daughter, my wife, and myself. I experienced the love of Christ through my daughter and my wife.

In retrospect, I didn’t respond to fatherhood in a fashion that would be exemplary or role-modelish by any means. With that said, I have stepped up and taken the lead as father, lover, leader, spiritual head, teacher, and more, that my family needs. Over this last year I have been blessed in countless ways, and I mean that not figuratively, I really can’t count how many times I’ve been blessed as a result of being Mayla’s father. She has taught me a lot, and continues to do so.

While the start was not ideal in our book, by any means, it is exactly what the Good Doctor had on order for us. I’m thankful for our journey to date, and I’m thankful to continue on this journey, though it is challenging, sometimes bleak, and extremely confusing as of late. My two girls are the most important and precious people in the world to me, and I wouldn’t trade anything over the last year for something different.

Happy Birthday Mayla. Thank you! I love you! May you continue to grow ridiculously strong, and bless others with your joy, smiles, and disgusting slobbery kisses. You are such a gift to mommy and papi.