Alison's story

I don't think I've ever blogged about when I was pregnant with Alison. At our 16 week ultrasound, the tech noticed that her head was considerable smaller than it should be. Apparently, this can be a sign of chromosomal abnormalities. We were sent to a specialist who did a more detailed ultrasound, plus an amniocentesis. We knew that no matter what, we were keeping the baby, but we wanted to know what we were dealing with. The ultrasound revealed that not only was the head size way too small, there was also a thickened portion at the base of the skull, which was another sign that this baby might have chromosomal problems.

We had to wait 2 weeks for the amnio results to come back. During this time, we shared our story with everyone and asked them to pray. I know we were surrounded by prayers because I wasn't hysterical with worry like I normally would have been. When the results came back, it showed that there were no chromosomal problems! We were over joyed, but the doctors were still concerned because there had to be a reason her head was so small.

I had ultrasounds every two weeks to monitor her growth and each test continued to show the head size was too small. At approximately 32 weeks, following another ultrasound, my doctor walked into the exam room with a strange look on her face. She said, "Judy, I don't know how to explain this, because I've never seen anything like this before. But, the baby's head size is normal now". I started to cry, but then I explained to her that I knew that God had healed the baby in utero. Our prayers had been answered!

We had been having a hard time deciding on a name for the baby. We had a few names we liked, but couldn't decided for sure on anything. Thornton and I had always wanted to name one of our children "Alison" after his sister who had committed suicide in 1987. But we just weren't sure if his parents would be OK with that. We didn't want any bad memories to come back to them. After we found out that the baby's head was normal sized, my father in law called me. I could tell that his voice was a bit choked back. He said to me, "Mom and I were wondering if you might consider naming this baby Alison". I started bawling. Of course, that's what we had to name her. Her middle name is "Grace", because she is a physical representation of God's grace in our lives.

8 years ago yesterday, Alison came into the world w/ a bang. I was scheduled for a C-section on Monday, June 28th. Friday night at 10:30, my water broke and my placenta had abrupted, so I was bleeding heavily. Thornton rushed me to the hospital and Alison was born by C-section at 11:58 p.m. She is Thornton's child through and through. She is *just* like him and she adores her Daddy like no other little girl has. We got her name right!