First day of baby Stuart's life

Last day of being pregnant. Monday June 25, 2012. The next morning I had a scheduled induction for convenience reasons. His actual due date was the 27th. I called the hospital at 6AM and they said to come in at 7:30AM. Morning traffic was bad so we didn't get to the hospital until a little after 9AM. When they hooked me up to the monitors they discovered that baby was in distress. His heart rate would plumet everytime I was moved from laying on my side. They wanted to do a c-section to get him out quickly, but with a prayer and a little patience he came on his own at 5:27PM Tuesday, June 26th 2012. I buckled under the pain and had an epidural, but it was for nothing. Within minutes of getting the shot he was born. So I had an epidural for after the birth! The umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck 6 times and this is what was causing his distress. The doctor and nurses said they had never seen that before. He weighed 7lbs. 9oz. and was 20 inches long.

Baby Stuart Ely Mushala minutes after being born. We were so happy to see him. The pediatrician who was on call to see him (who happens to be Nigerian) found that he had an imperforated anus (no anal opening). He was whisked away from us to undergo a multitude of tests to see if anything else was out of sorts. Thankfully all his other organs were found healthy after the tests were read on Wednesday.

This is Stuart and I seeing him for the first time in the NICU several hours later. As a precaution, all new NICU babies are put in isolation and so we had to wear these yellow robes whenever we wanted to see him for the first couple of days. Stuart also gave him a father's blessing at this time. If I ever wondered why I married Stuart, I don't now. :-) He has been my rock throughout this whole experience. He has been so postive and full of faith. I have felt us become much more unified and I'm very grateful for that.

My beautiful boy.