What a week!!

Ok, I have never had a more stressful, exhilarating, terrifying, happy, exhausting, fill in adjective of your choice kind of week. Last Thursday I was on my way home from a hospital visit. I stopped into a coffee shop to get a little pick-me-up and Lesa calls, absolutely hysterical and weeping, "MY WATER BROKE!!" (She did NOT want to have a leap day baby and this was about 12:30 pm on the 28th). So I hurry out to my car amdist strange looks (it's not everyday that a man in a clerical collar starts yelling out in joy that his wife's water just broke). I get home and load up the soggy mama and we head over to the hospital. We get through OB Triage and into a labor and delivery room and the nurse and doctor are monitoring everything. You know how doctors have that way of talking really quietly and intensely, so as to not "disturb" the patient with the potential of bad news? That's what they were doing. The doc was concerned about the baby's heart-rate being too high for the stage of labor Lesa was in. So they inform us that they have decided to do a c-section. They whisk Lesa out of the room and hand me a pair of scrubs, face-mask, hair-net and little paper booties. 15 minutes later I am in the OR sitting next to my wife's head while two doctors, an anesthesiologist and several nurses work on getting our baby out. Another 15 minutes pass and we hear the doctor say "It's a girl, she's adorable and she's pooping!"

Unfortunately, our little Lena had aspirated some of the poo-poo and also had a fever. She was whisked away into the special care nursery while mommy was being sewn back up and taken to recovery.

To make a long story short, our little girl, Carolena Reve Roemke was born wieghing 8 lbs. 3 oz. and 19 inches long. She was in an oxygen tent for the first 20 hours of her life. We got to leave the hospital on Monday, March 3. She has her last dose of antibiotics (due to the aspiration) this evening (a nurse comes to our house and gives it via IV). Our first few days have been so hectic, but a real joy.

I have learned in these few days a whole new depth and intimacy in prayer. What a wonderful thing! Here is a link to several pictures of our little Lena.

Thank you for your continued prayers. Thankfully, Grandma Sheryl is coming tonight to spend the weekend with us, hopefully we will get things a little more stabilized and get some sleep.