McKinley Beth: Day 3

Guest Documentarian: The daddy.
Reason for Guest Documentarian: mommy currently hooked up to a pumping machine.

McKinley Beth weighs about 5 lbs and 2.5 oz. She has lost some weight but so far she has not lost as much as her older brother Jackson lost in his 24 hour hospital stay. Crazy. Speaking of big brother...

QUICK JACKSON UPDATE: Daddy got to see Jackson for the first time since daddy left for work Monday morning. Mommy has not seen the sweet big brother since Monday afternoon. Honey and Poppa (mommy's mommy and daddy) have been keeping him. They brought the J Train up to the hospital so daddy could have some much needed J time. Since J is such a climber, he still cannot get to see mommy since he wouldn't understand why he cannot be physically affectionate with her.

So back to our Squeaky Fighter. Dr. Letton and his team will come get her Friday morning between 10 and 11. Then for about three hours, they will be ending the omphalocele era. Mommy has processed the procedure a little bit better than Big Daddy has. Big Daddy about teared up and broke down when the possibility of his sweet and perfect little Fighter being on a ventilator came up. But he held it together long enough to get past the moment. Plus Big Daddy has been sleeping on Little Pull Out Bed from the Chair of Torture. So he hasn't really been sleeping well. That and the world's best nurses are also the perkiest and chattiest at about 2AM. I assume they slam a Red Bull and then sprint into our room to "holla" at D and check her vitals. While they make sure she was sleeping good, I roll over on the double wide ironing board and make sure my blanket covers my anger.

We appreciate your prayers for our baby girl. Poor sweet McKinley is so so strong. Everyone who has seen her has fallen in love with her. I took a precious couple up to see her last night and they are crushing hard on my baby girl. Every person who goes in there says that they could just stand and watch her all day. I can too. Until those stinky old doctors order those awesome nurses to poke and stick and wipe and measure and weigh and change my sweetly sleeping Squeaker.

They have to prick her heal to check her blood sugar levels. That is one of the concern areas for omphalocele babies. That picture breaks my heart. Poor sweet Fighter. She hardly even cries now. That pain is so familiar to her. She is so much stronger than I am.

But we hope that this time tomorrow we are writing about how she totally conquered that operating room and owned that procedure. We are hoping to write about how her doctor knocked it out of the park and showed all of the folks in that operating room and in all of the waiting rooms in the hospital, OKC, Dallas, Houston, Baton Rouge, Enid, Hot Springs, Newcastle and Edmond that he is, in fact, the best and most skilled doctor our Fighter could ask for.

So, for those of you who pray, pray according to the previous paragraph.

One last look at the sweetest little Fighter. I may have to rescind my comments about Poppa being the biggest pushover. It is amazing how a finger so tiny can have so many people wrapped so tightly around it.