Our baby girl

Thank you again for all of the prayers. Continue to lift Delaney up because she did have to start on some medication yesterday. I really was positive and felt like we would be home by this weekend. On Tuesday a nurse practitioner came in and looked over her chart. She told me it looked like she may go home on Wed. if everything looked good with her antibiotics. I was amazed and really excited! They told me I could "Room in" for the night. This means I have my own little hotel room down the hall and I got up every 3 hours to come in and feed her. I felt like she had a pretty good night but apparently the withdrawal symptoms started showing. When I got in here yesterday around 8, the nurse said she was starting her on Phenobarbital, an anti seizure med. It is supposed to help with the drug withdrawals :( We were told she would take this every12 hours, and if it started working, she could go home on this med. So, that was still a little encouraging. I spent the morning trying to figure out the financial stuff because in addition to all of the legal and medical things happening, now we are trying to make sure that we are not going to be charged a NICU visit. She was originally covered by Tenncare but when we got legal custody that changed. She can be added to my insurance but it still may be expensive. Also they may not go back to her date of birth, so those bills can really add up!

I had a sweet friend  bring me lunch yesterday and while we were eating Delaney got worse. Allen sent me a text that said "Brenda needs you!" Brenda is our nurse. I hurried back upstairs and she told me that she had gone into full withdrawals. Apparently she got really upset, had a high pitched scream and even had some tremors. Her poor body doesn't deserve what is happening to it. I just can't believe someone could harm a child in this way :( I just want to reach in and remove all the pain. I have prayed to God to please heal our sweet little girl. They started her on another strong drug that she takes every 3 hours in her bottle. This should help with the major issues and if we don't have to increase the dosage then they will slowly ween it off of her and we could still go home on the Pheno. drug. At this point it is hard to tell how long we will be here. Could be just a few more days or maybe several weeks. I just pray that this precious miracle be healed from the horrible things going on in her body.

My step mom came in yesterday. She is a lactation consultant/pediatric nurse, so she is a huge help with things like this. I really needed some moral support too because I was feeling pretty drained, overwhelmed, and worried. She got here about 2 yesterday and was able to feed and hold Delaney. She saw all the different side effects and just loved on her and prayed for her. We constantly tell her how blessed we are to call her ours. We are not sure why God chose us to be her mommy and daddy, but we are honored and more than excited to answer the call!!

We left yesterday afternoon to get finger printed AGAIN!! I'm telling you what, they sure don't make adoption of any kind easy. If people had to jump through all of these hoops to have a baby, we wouldn't have many I can tell you that :) Just the legal and financial stuff alone is overwhelming. I just want to be a mommy and I'm being pulled away to go to court and do paperwork. I know it will all be worth it though. We ate dinner at Cracker Barrel and Gloria bought us this Willow Tree statue. I have wanted it for a while and now its perfect for our situation. I put it on her special shelf in the room.

Nana Glo feeding Delaney

When we came back over last night we helped give her a bath. Then Glo and I rocked and read to her. Allen came in and read to her also. We are definitely trying to get a nightly routine established so when she does come home we will already have it in place :) I've been looking forward to bath and reading time with a sweet one forever :) I know it will be one of the most cherished times of my day! I got a pretty good nights sleep and Gloria fixed us a nice breakfast. I got over here about 930 and she was sleeping so peacefully.

She had a pretty good night last night. The medicine seems to be working because her levels were down. If they stay down over a period of several days then she will slowly be weened off. I fed her a little while ago and she was wonderful. Her score was REALLY low this time :) They won't adjust meds till probably Saturday though so we still have a long way to go! Vanessa, Adam, and Hannah will be in this weekend so hopefully they will get to meet her. I can't wait till she comes home so we can take pics of Hannah and Delaney together. I have been working on her birth announcement this morning. I can't wait to take good pictures to share with everyone. The cell phone is an easy and quick way to communicate and share pics right now. We are still not posting on FB because of legal stuff. It stinks because I really really want to say something about my precious baby girl!! The time will come tho :) I am very hopeful God is paving the way and knows what He is doing. Four years ago I never imagined this would be where I was....I wanted to have a baby so badly and wanted to experience pregnancy. While I haven't lost that hope, I am SOOOO glad God chose us to endure a bit of a test of faith to see if we were willing and capable of standing up to the test. He knew this little innocent baby would need a mommy and daddy, and that we should be that for her. If that meant all the years of infertility and suffering were to bring us to here, in the NICU with our sweet daughter Delaney Jane, then I am so glad HE knew what He was doing and that He didn't let me get in the way. What a sweet story we can share with others about God's faithfulness. And the way that He brought her to us in such a special way....

Love this pic! She is so tiny next to Allen's hands.

Here are a few pics of the door and board in her room :) She also has a little bookshelf that we put her books we read every night on there as well as the pic frame Rachel did for us :) It's a little piece of home here at the hospital.

Her name tag on her room :)

Continue to pray for our special little miracle! God's got big plans for her I have a feeling ;) We just love to stare at her and thank God for entrusting her little life in our hands. We love our sweet girl!!!