William Riley

William “resolute protector”; Riley “one of great strength”.

After the many battles this baby boy had endured, we knew he must be destined for great things, and needed a strong name. While we were in the hospital, several hours after he was born, Billy pulled out a Christian baby name book, came across Riley, and read to us a scripture that was tagged with it: “My grace is sufficient for thee; for My strength is made perfect in weakness”. We knew in that moment that this would be our son's name.

Here is our week in pictures...

and if you want to see more of the birth, I posted a large amount of

beautiful shots taken by Will's Uncle Aaron on myspace.

March 4th-
9:00 pm- After 21 hours of laboring at home, my contractions had held at about 5 minutes apart, with some random sets as long as 13 minutes in between. We decided at this point to head to the hospital and see how the baby was handling everything. They checked me in and I was only dialated to a 4. This was hard to believe considering the amount of time already spent in hard labor. About 3 hours later, we’d made very little progress, and after a very serious contraction, the baby’s heart rate decelerated for a period of 7 minutes. Several nurses were alerted, the on-call doctor was paged from home, and I was given an oxygen mask. At one point, I heard my labor and delivery nurse yell out “Don’t code!” (I don't think she even meant to say it out loud) and I knew this was a serious issue we were facing with the life of our child. Not even an hour later, it happened a second time, and we didn’t want to run the risk of stressing his body anymore with a potential 6 hours or more of labor ahead. Will was delivered by cesearean at 2:54 am, on his due date- March 5th, 2009. Weighing in at only 5lbs 12 oz and 19 ¾” long, this tiny little boy has already melted our hearts forever.

We were given some test results today on our cesearean. They had sent my placenta off to pathology for testing, to see exactly why we never progressed, and why Will was so small. It turns out there were enfarctions in the placenta that basically died off. Blood clots formed, and the nutrients and oxygen were cut off for Will in those areas. This affected his ability to perform during labor, and it also affected the fat he would have been storing up the last few weeks in utero. We are so THANKFUL for the doctors instict to go ahead with the C-Section. God is good and we are blessed our son's doing so well!




March 7th-
Will got to come home in a Hummer! Billy's parents rented an expedition when they came in to town, but when they picked it up, it had been upgraded :) Since Will was so stinkin' small, his "coming home outfit" was way too big, so Uncle Todd came to the rescue and bought him an adorable preemie set with a baseball cap and everything. We placed him in his bed, and he was smaller than his stuffed animals. He didn't even look real. It was adorable.


March 8th- The Dedication of our Son
Since we had both families in town, we thought there would be no better time to offer our son back to the Lord in an intimate celebration at our home. Pastor David Summerlin came and blessed us all with a beautiful and sweet and holy time of offering Will back to God. Many of those present spoke words of blessing over him, and there wasn't a dry eye in the house (literally). It was such a special time. I'll post pictures when I get them.


March 9th- First Doctors Visit
While we were in the hospital, the on-call pediatrician turned out to be the pediatrician I had when I was a kid! I used to go see him up until I was 21 yrs old! LOL. He does a wonderful job, and is a great listener, so we decided to use him as well. Will got weighed in at 5lb 4oz. today. Hopefully this is the end of the normal weight loss phase for him.



March 12-
Will is 1 week old today! He went in to the doctors today for a blocked tear duct, and also because we hadn't changed a wet diaper in several hours....they ended up catheterizing him and that boy had 13 cc's in him! The doc laughed and said at least he's not dehydrated! He's getting plenty of food, and he just has a big bladder :) He gained 2 ounces since the last doctors appointment (losing birth weight is normal, but we needed him to start gaining again), and he's nursing really well (hallelujah!). His tiny mouth made it hard for him to suck properly, since he didn't have the fat stores most babies are born with. Thanks to mom's, mothers in law, aunts, cousins and friends working and working on it with me, my boy learned how to eat! Every feeding seems to be getting better and better. We've weaned off the shield, are off all formula supplements, and he is starting to get fat on his little body. I can officially kiss some real cheeks now!