"... and pray it makes you whole"

(Before I start this blog, I want to tell everyone that Ella is doing so well and continuing to amaze us. We were told today that she goes in for her first open heart surgery at 7:30am tomorrow. Speechless. You can do this, Ella May...we're all here).

This is a long one...brace yourselves.

So I said earlier that I couldn't get up the energy to blog, but then I realized that more than that, I couldn't find a way to sleep. Thoughts, fears, worries, anticipation, sorrow, love, anger....oh anger....they've all taken over my mind. I dont think I've ever had so many thoughts crammed into one space at a time. Its debilitating. My heart is aching, aching, screaming for all of my prayers to be answered and for peace within my family and the families I've come to love now that I'm part of this "heart baby," club.

I had a moment earlier today where I told my mom that I'm having a hard time seeing God these days and I wasn't really sure where to go from there. Why would he allow these babies to suffer, why would he put them on this earth only to take them away, why would he leave their families behind with gaping holes in their now broken hearts? I'm still struggling with this, but the tiny glimmer of hope and knowledge I've found is that there has to be something bigger than this, that we can't see now or even begin to fathom. I believe in God and I believe in Heaven...so why shouldn't I feel peace that these angels are now in the greatest place they could ever be, with someone who loves them more than anyone ever could? Because my heart feels like its being chipped away at. And I mourn for their parents and the people who loved them most. And it just wont ever feel natural that a child should pass before their parents. So here I am, living in limbo of what my head is telling me and what my heart is telling me. I've never been a fan of limbo.

But then...

I wrote in my last post that when Lissa gave birth to Ella yesterday morning she was immediately taken away to check her heart and get her hooked up to things. Liss never got to hold her and only saw her for about 2 minutes total before Ella was transfered to the hospital next door to her, Children's Hospital LA. Liss had a C-section so was on mandatory bedrest for the first 24 hrs and we were told by our hospital that Liss wouldn't  be able to leave the hospital until sometime on Friday bc it was against hospital policy and not an option. The rest of our family who's here (Maddy, Mom, Dana, Brady and myself) were able to go next door and visit her, though not touch her much because of everything she's hooked up to and the fact that germs are EXTRA dangerous for her. It has been killing Lissa to not see her precious baby, hold her, have those first beautiful moments where your family meets her for the first time. We'd come back from visiting Ella telling each other "we really need to be careful not to gush about Ella to Lissa too much..we dont want her to feel left out or like she's on the outside looking in." ...that was really, really hard, because this baby is everything to gush about. When we found out today that Ella's surgery would be tomorrow (we knew there was a chance it could be that day, but were pretty convinced it would be Monday) it absolutely tore Lissa apart because she couldn't imagine having her day old baby go into heart sugery without her mom there..and without having ever had the chance to hold her...who could?Needless to say  it was torture for us to watch her in that kind of pain. She called her Dr, we talked to the surgeons next door (who were on our side!) the nurses, anyone, to see what we could do to get Liss in there to see Ella, just briefly, before her surgery. That door was shut faster than we could open it. Liss was contemplating discharging herself a day early and saying screw it to the Drs orders against it and there wasn't much we could do to convince her otherwise.

...so here comes the lighter part of this blog (I know its needed and I'm sorry to have to vent so much)...Maddy and I were taking the elevator downstairs around 8:00, going next door to kiss Ella goodnight, when I suddenly realized I couldn't watch my sissy's face in that pain anymore. I asked
Maddy, "should we go steal Lissa and sneak her over there?"  :) That smiley face is exactly what spread over Maddy's face, and if you know her, you know she was in 100%.  Lets do this. I called my mom as we were still traveling down the 7 floors on the elevator and told her our plan...
mom: And how do you think we'd be able to do that?
ash: we'll just walk her out, sneak her over and in!
Maddy: no, we'd definitely need a wheelchair.
Mom: Well obviously, she can't get over there without a wheelchair
Ash: So if I can find us a wheelchair, will you do it?
Mom:...sure!  (you were soooo doubting us, Mom!) :)
    LITERALLY, at this moment the elevator door opens on the 1st floor and there is an old, filipino nurse with an empty wheelchair. I'm not kidding, it happened just like that. We try and convince this lady that we need a wheelchair to get my sister around so she can get some air and after a bunch of back and forth, she says "well I could give you this one, but it can only be used by patients on the 7th floor where it belongs." ...7th floor?!?! Um, perfect? We travel back up the 7 floors with her and she insists on pushing it to Lissa's room (no good) but is then called away by another nurse who needed help. Maddy and I took that moment and as calmly and "normally" as we could, slowly sauntered back to Lissas room with the chair. Once we got to the room mom and Lissa couldn't believe it and we told her to hurry up, put a jacket on, put a hat on and get in the chair! We were all cracking up, rushing around and poor Liss started to get emotional about possibly getting the chance to see Ella. Got her in the wheelchair and off we went, down 2 long halls, past 2 nurses stations and into the elevator. We couldn't believe we'd actually made it past them!  Once we got past security and made it outside of the hospital you could just feel the relief pouring off all of us! We called Brady and Dana who were already in visiting Ella and they didn't even believe us. :) Racing Liss across the street we tried to get in Children's Hospital from a back door we always go though, because its way closer, but found that is was already locked so we pushed the call button and were told by a voice that this entrance was closed and we had to go allll the way around to the other side. There was a small group of hospital workers on their breaks right near us, and at that very moment some guy walked up to us and said "I'll get you guys in. You never saw me, I never saw you." ....is this really happening? He didn't even know we had an escapee on our hands! We rushed in the hospital, up the elevator, down the halls, down another elevator and finally made it to the last security man who said only Lissa and I could get in because I already had a visitors pass on from earlier and Ella's room already had the maximum amount of people allowed in her room. This was a super tough moment, because we'd all made it this far together and now they wouldn't be able to see Ella and Lissa finally together but mom pushed us and yelled "go!" and off we went...up the elevator, again, and finally approaching Ella's room. I dont think my heart has ever pounded in my chest so fast before. The moment my sister layed eyes on that precious baby laying there, I knew that I was witnessing one of the most beautiful things I would ever see in my life. It was unreal. We took pictures and just stared at the two of them really together for the first time. Just when I started feeling guilty about mom and maddy, there they were! Apparently my mom somehow got ahold of a visitors pass, tore it in 2, and put one half on her, half under her jacket so it looked whole...Maddy did the same with the other half. Did I mention my family is clever as hell?

So there we all were, together in baby Ella's private room, silent and just watching the two of them together. It doesn't get much better than that. Even Ella's nurse, who knew the room capacity was 2, said "let me just shut these blinds for you guys...I'll be right next door." We stayed for a good 20 minutes and decided it was harder to get Lissa OUT of that room then it was to get her in! :) We made our way back to the hospital 30 minutes after the time where they kick visitors out...up the elevators, down the halls and back into Lissas room...where they never suspected a thing. Best decision we've ever made.

I guess my whole point of this blog, besides sharing our prison escape adventure, is that throughtout the whole time, we kept seeing God everywhere. He put this in our hearts and made this happen...the man at the locked door, the empty halls, the kind nurse, the lady who appeared with the wheelchair at the perfect
second, EVERYTHING happening at the EXACT moment we needed it to, ...all of it. And more than that, in my sisters and brother-in-laws eyes as they stared down at this miracle baby that just came into our lives. So though  I know I'm always going to have questions as to why he makes the decisions he does..and maybe I'll never really understand completely...but in this moment I have never been so sure of the fact that God knows exactly what he is doing.

Please pray for my niece tomorrow morning and keep her in your thoughts. I love you, Ella May. <3