The First time we heard Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia

June 4, 2008 forever changed our lives. We were so excited to go to our Ultrasound appointment. We were told that this would be the day we would know if we were having a boy or a girl. I met with Shane at the hospital after work. I was nervous and had a weird feeling something was wrong all day. The songographer started the ultrasound and was very chatty with us. She never made us feel like there was anything wrong. Shane and I did notice she did focus on the chest alot. We told her we didn't want to know if it was a boy or girl. We asked her to write it down on a piece of paper for us to take with us to dinner to celebrate when we opened it. The Doctor came in and was very serious. She looked at me and said there is something wrong with our baby. I froze, looked at Shane, and tears started to come down my face. The Dr. then said she needed to take a closer look and would answer any questions after she was done. I asked if it was serious, the Dr. respomded yes. I lost it! I couldn't stop crying. Shane and I held hands as the Dr. was taking a second look. Then the Doctor told us our baby has Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia. Shane and I looked at each other and were puzzled, what is that? The Docotor just kept saying liver up. We were clueless about CDH. The Doctor walked out to give us a minute alone. Shane and I held each other tight and cried. We then decided to look at the piece of paper the songrapher gave us. We found out we were having a girl. We had a amnio done that same day to make sure ther were no other abnormalities. I was scared the entire time I almost passed out when I saw the needle go into my tummy.

Shane and I drove home in seperate cars. I prayed the entire way home and couldn't stop crying. Shane and I didn't have any idea of what we were up against. Shane went on the internet to research CDH while I sat on the couch crying my eyes out with Twinkie and Molly next to me. Shane and I couldn't go to work so we both stayed home for two days. Shane searched on the internet non stop for CDH information. While I just cried and prayed. I never asked why me? Instead I said God please help us. All of the information we were getting on the internet was making us feel hopeless. We finally came across Breath of Hope and Cherubs, these two websites helped us so much. Everyone on their were so helpful and we will forever be grateful. We started finding blogs that we got hope from: Claire, Ava and Cadenne. I will always remember these three because I was glued to them for comfort. Now it's our turn to do the same for someone else. We have a miracle that God gave us and we thank God everyday. Not a day goes by that we don't thank God for our precious little girl. When she is happy we laugh, when she is upset we comfort her and when she cries we hold her tight and love her. We will never forget June 4, 2008 and how it changed our lives forever. We have a circle of CDH families that were once strangers and now feel very close to and have supported us along the way. We thank all of our friends and family for continued support. We had the strength to get through this because of you. We are forever grateful and love you.

We have all the CDH babies fighting the battle in our prayers and those families who are finding out that their baby is diagnosed with Congenital Diaphragmtic Hernia. We also have special prayers to all the mommy and daddy's who have lost their precious little one to CDH. We think of your little angels every night.

This song touched me in a way that I will never forget when I found out Nayeli was diagnosed with CDH. It reminds me to Praise God in good times and bad. I found this video and thought I would share it.