If Greyson can smile...

Then I guess we have to put on a smile. A smile was a hard thing to come by from both LEigh and I this evening as we found out the little guy indeed will need a shunt :( We knew it was coming, it was almost like we were just trying to squeak out another week, or two or a month... we were hanging onto anything. It seems pretty heavy and hard to bare right now, and although we say to ourselves "Really, one more thing God, you really think we can handle one more thing?" we trust we can make it through.

Oh yeah, I guess I should return to my previous post and remind myself that life includes detours...and guess what? the traffic is backed up and we have to go around somehow. And we will, we'll navigate through this one and reconnect with the road soon enough.

This surgery, which is scheduled for 7AM this thursday, is "a piece-of-cake" by comparison to his closure surgery a couple weeks ago. The kicker for us being we got to take this little guy home and discovered we loved him even more than when he was first born!!! So to see him go thru another surgery is obviously going to be very difficult for us.

So with surgery come risks of scary things, things the neurosurgeon "roboticly" spewed at us. I just have a feeling most neurosurgeons just aren't the life of the party, or someone you'd particularly want to have a bite to eat with. (any neurosurgeons reading this, I apologize...keep being brilliant and helping babies like ours) We pray our surgeon again is at his best, and nails the procedure! So as scared as we are now, we've already been reminded that we are not alone, and we find comfort in this. Thank you to all, we love you and really need you these days.

On a lighter note... after coming home from work I needed to hold my boy badly. Leigh had just finished feeding him so i snatched him up, and layed on the couch with him on my chest. It was great...until I heard i rumbling in his throat. I tried to move, but it was too late, he spit up big time, right down my shirt!!! yep, I'm officially a dad. :)

love to all,

the Gibbs'

Prayers for Monday

Today Great Grandma Gibbs was finally able to meet her first great grandson, and she was as excited as any 95 year old women I'd ever seen! She kept saying "There's nothing softer." as she rubbed his face and little hands. It was a very special moment to have her hold Greyson, and to be honest a couple years ago we thought the chances of her seeing a great-grandchild was pretty far-fetched. But shes surprised a lot of people and is doing well these days!

Another busy day spent with family and friends. At times its been exhausting, but exhausted is our new reality at this moment. The quicker we except it and don't fight it the better we will adapt to it.

One large prayer request for Greyson on Monday, hes got his head ultrasound in the morning and then a trip to the neurosurgeon to evaluate the results. We have been having such a great week with grey that we are really not looking forward to this appointment. So we pray that Greyson might dodge the bullet and his ventricles will not have not increased, thus no shunt this week. But if he does need it we pray we can approach it with calming peace and understanding. So send em' our way this evening and tomorrow. We'll let you all know the outcome tomorrow evening.
I had a better photo day today, so here's a few new pics.

love,

leigh, andy, grey

The good little church boy.

So this evening we thought we'd give going to church with a small baby a shot and got ready for the 5:30 service at Ada Bible Church. We gave ourselves plenty of time to get ready and made sure the little guy had a belly full of food so he'd be happy, and off we went. My whole life it just drives me crazy when i hear a baby crying in church, and then hear the parent "shhhh...shhhhing" them as if they will really listen!!! Just take the baby out!! I'd yell to myself, feeling my temperature rising!! And so now I enter into that category of my life, the parent that bravely enters the sanctuary, child in hand, and with one mission...keep this little guy quite throughout the entire service. Sure I guess it be OK if he belted out a few crys during the opening worship songs, but i was banking on him being zonked out the entire service.

And so we found a seat, near the back, at the end of the aisle, easily accessible was the exit just in case. Trust me, I wasn't gonna be that guy with the baby crying his head off, and just sitting in my seat thinking he'd shut up eventually. I thought this one through. hehe.

Let me just say that when we finally settled in and sat down, Leigh holding greyson, me sipping on that wonderful church provided coffee, it was like the Gibbs family came full circle. Let me explain...
Last september, when we found out our little guy had SB it pretty much knocked me down to nothing. This was hurt I had never experienced before, and hurt I wont ever forget. But that September at Ada Bible was a series that spoke directly to Leigh and I, to the point that we thought our life was being "bugged" and used as an example every week during the teaching. The teacher spoke of "Detours" and how these were not simply found on our Michigan roadways (Michigan roads are horrible) but also show up in real life. A perfect example would be Leigh and I's situation with greyson. We're driving along going a little over the speed limit in my 88 caprice classic and then we want to start a family and Leigh becomes pregnant, and we keep going on the road all is good, life is amazing, and then we get to 131 Northbound and find out our little guy has something called spina bifida and it will Permanently effect him for the rest of his life... This is OUR DETOUR. So we reroute and find our way around...months and months of worrying, wondering, praying, crying, researching, crying, regrouping, and finally discovering hope, peace, comfort.
So this is how we have approached our Detour in life... WE've been re-routed, our plan has changed significantly, but our ultimate destination remains the same. WE still need to raise this little guy to be the strongest, smartest, kindest, most self-suffient man we can. So the goal, or destination hasn't changed, just how we get there.

So sitting in church holding our little greyson, (we'll maybe at that time we weren;t holding him, he is a popular boy these days) we were reminded of the Detour we were on and how it seems by just having greyson here with us we;ve in someway got back on the road headed north and are crusing with the windows down again. At least for a short while, we know other detours are ahead of us but we feel we've found our way again. oh and Greyson didn't make a peep in church, much to the delight of his old man. :)

love to all,

the Gibbs Crew.

PS sorry no pictures this time. I wasn't please with how todays shot turned out, its was the lighting or something. hehehe :)

We can't get enough

So there's nothing really new to report today, but i spent a good chunk of the day taking pictures of the little guy and just want to post a couple new ones. It's so much easier to snap a shot without him being hooked up to a monitor. IT's so great to have him home!

enjoy,


love andy, leigh, & grey

Out on the town!

So it's been a few days at home with our little guy and things have been going quite well. Any sort of scheduling has been thrown out the window, in fact we had an appointment at 9 this morning, but realized that would be tricky to make happen so re-scheduled for the afternoon :) We have to add some "cushion" time in to anything we do at this point, because we are trying to figure out how long things take with a little guy. It's been much easier because its been both Leigh and I tag teaming to figure things out this week. The real test will be next week when i head back to work and leave Leigh to fend for herself. But from what I've observed, she's a natural at this mom thing and will have no problem at all.

This week has been great, we've had visitors every day, and even better every time someones come to say hi to greyson, they've also brought us food! It's been wonderful not having to think about making a meal and such. thank you to all!

So greyson has hit the town on a few occasions this week. His latest venture was to his pediatrician appointment this afternoon. The little guy did pretty good considering he had to take all his nice warm clothes off and be poked and prodded. And according to the Doc he's doing well falling right into the middle percentile with pretty much everything. His back continues to look better everyday and sure enough, he keeps getting cuter every day.

This has definitely been different than any other "vacation" i've taken off of work. But honestly have to say its been one of the best. Lounging on the couch, catching up on spring training baseball, dozing off, me and grey are getting really good at all these things! :)

So today is his 2 week birthday. It's funny how he's changed just in 2 weeks. I look at him and the pictures i took on day 1 and think "wow, this little guys getting big" I guess thats what 9 oz does to beef up a little guy.

So we just wanted to drop an update and let everyone know that we are hangin in there and fully embracing parenting. We just ask for continued prayers for greyson as he has his follow up ultrasound monday to see if his ventricles have increased. We will keep you all posted as to the outcome and how the next week will unfold.

love

andy.leigh,grey

HOME!!!! part two

So yes, somehow i've taken over the role as head blogger of the family, something i would have never guessed i'd be involved with months ago, but here I am, and its actually been quite helpful as we've gone on this journey. So anyway, yesterday was quite a ride for us hearing the news that we could actually take our G-man home!! This was a complete surprise to us, we were preparing for a tuesday surgery, pysching ourselves up to deal with the Dr telling us "Yes, his ventricles have increased, and yes, he will need the shunt surgery tuesday" But, "No" instead he said there was no change, and that he'll be checked in a week. We were somewhat torn. Was this just delaying the inevitable or was this an answer to our prayers the previous night? We've learned to hang on to even the slighest bit of hope these past months and this is no different. Remember the previous post when i said i was fed up with the hospital and had to get out!!! Well guess what, next day and we're outta there! And yes, i know the statistics and yes he probably will need a shunt, but for this week we've got our little guy where we want him, at home!!!

So when the doctor finally gave him the official OK to leave it was beyond surreal. After saying goodbye to our two favorite nurses we had to ask a few times "so we can just leave?" "Do we have to scan him or something?" But no, he was ours and off we went. Walking out of the hospital we just really didn't think it was real, he was gonna come home. After pulling the car up front we securely fastened him in, I tugged on that latch plenty of times and made sure he wasn't going anywhere. And so he was in and we were off to make the 10 minute journey home. Leigh sat in the back as to "protect" him from anything the car seat couldn't. I'm wondering how long she'll sit in the back there with him. hahaha. It was like i was back taking my drivers ed test, hands at 10 and 2, yielding, cautiously proceeding at intersections. I was beyond cautious. This i'm sure is the mindset of every mother or father driving there child home for the first time ever. :)

So we made it home and after a tour of his new digs Leigh and I had a moment of "Ok, now what?" "I dont know, we could put him in his pj's?" "Ok, sure lets do that"
So we bundled him up and I did the only thing I thought was right at the time. I placed him on his side on the floor and put my face 1 inch from his and just looked at him. His little hands would occasional touch my face...my heart melted even more. :)

The first night went well I think, It's not like i have anything to compare it too, but he got up at 1 and 5 AM and Leigh and I tag teamed, changed, fed, cleaned, rocked, and back to bed. His noise machine is amazing, its like a babbling brook is running right through our bedroom. hahaha. So today has been pretty chill, adjust to life with our new little roommate. Trying to figure out what we needs, when he needs it and how much he needs. So we continue to pray for the health of this little guy and pray that he will continue to bless our family as he already has so much.

Love,

the Gibbs'

HOME!!!

Andy is typically the blogger of the family, but I just couldn't wait to share this news!! Our G man is finally coming home! I just talked with his neurosurgeon and he has escaped a shunt for this week! Most likely he will still need one at some point, but not tomorrow! We will continue to have weekly head ultrasounds to check him out. I'm sure that andy will post a much more entertaing post soon, I just wanted to share our great news!

Love to all
Leigh Grey and Andy