Fourth day in the life of baby

When I cam to the hospital (at this point I have been discharged and Stuart and I each come once a day) I found these IV's stuck in his head. Babies don't keep IV's very well and so they kept having to find new places to find veins. Before my visit for the night was over, the left vein had blown and they had to remove that IV and stick him in his arm. The doctor's thought they were going to have to run a PICC line through his body so that they wouldn't have to mess with the IV's, but we really didn't want that. It's painful and it runs a high risk of infection. Miraculously it never came to that.

What are you thinking about baby?

Thula accompanied me on this visit. She's a good big sister.

Are those horns on your head little baby?

Before I left I covered his head and now he looks like a little angel. The red splotch on his face his from the tape they were using to hold down his oxygen tube (since removed). He also has a smaller GI tube at this point so they are pulling out less stomach bile. We are on our way to real feeding!

Third day of Stuart's life

Somebody likes his binky! The next day after surgery baby looked much better.

Wake up little guy we want to play with you!

Big yawn! He yawns just like his dad.

Cry face!

Groggy face!

Sleepy face!

My three kids!

When we were getting ready to leave the nurse covered him all up and then he stuck out his little foot. Cute!

Second day of baby Stuart's life

Thula and Lela came to see their new baby brother before surgery. They were both so excited. Prior to this the bishop came and helped Stuart give baby a priesthood blessing. It was a beautiful prayer.

This was right before surgery. I was a weepy mess. The surgeon, Dr. Donner was a woman who was so kind I just felt that he was in a good hands though. The surgery took about 90 minutes. They were giving him a colostomy. His next surgery in a few months will be to create an anal opening and then he will have a third when he's about 6 months to reconnect his colon to his rectum.

This is several hours after surgery when they finally allowed us to see him. Words cannot describe what I was feeling, but if I could have taken all that pain away I would have.



The GI tube through his nose is removing excess stomach bile. He had that until Sunday morning.

Night night baby.
A lady from Stuart's work who is originally from Tanzania said that her brother is a pastor in that country. He has several churches throughout the country and once a week the congregations hold a prayer service where they pray at the same time for people who are sick. She had put our baby's name on that list and so on the day of his surgery many people in Tanzania were praying for our son. Another lady belongs to a world wide prayer circle were people get on the phone and connect through three way calling or something like that and also pray for people. She had put our son's name on their prayer list and he was also prayed over. A friend from our church drove to the Louisville temple and also put our son's name on the temple prayer rolls. And not to forget the prayers of all our friends and family from Zambia-to various US states. I frimly believe that it was through the faith of prayers and priesthood blessings that Stuart had a successful surgergy and no other organs in his body needed mending. His surgeon's all said how rare it was for him not to have heart, esophagus, kidney, or bladder issues in tandem with his imperforated anus.

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.