Daddy's little girl

The day is soon arriving where our youngest Emmalee Grace will be entering the operating room for surgery. It seems the the umbilical cord did not disconnect itself correctly once she came out of the womb causing a tiny sac to develop under her belly button. In addition to that her belly button did not seal completely, so every once and a while she will have some puss and blood discharge.

I share this information with all of you for three reasons. The first is to keep you updated as to what is going on in Princes Emma's life. The second is so you may have the specifics in order for your prayers to be lifted up for her and for us in our time of need for strength, hope, courage, support and faith. The third reason for my writing is quite selfish but necessary. It is so that I to can air out, express myself and put my deepest heart felt feelings, thoughts and emotions on paper. In other words, I am using it as a much needed therapeutic tool for my emotional, physical and spiritual well being. I must confess that it has help both me and my wife out greatly to be able to share openly and freely our experiences with baby Emmalee.

I would like to thank all of you that have commented on our blog and facebook. We appreciate it very much and need to hear those uplifting words of affirmation, exhortation and compassion. We ask that you please keep us continuously in your prayers. My wife and I are working on a prayer list that will be posted soon, so please keep an eye out for it.

Your probably asking yourself: Where are all these touchy feely things that Pg was talking about? Well my friends, here they are. My human nature is exhausted. This week alone I have been staying up till 3am in the morning in order to feed Emmalee and not risk staying asleep and skipping her grub (The Doctors are constantly emphasizing the importance of her weight gain, so I want to make sure that she does not miss a feed on my watch). Right now I am thinking the heavier the better for Emma. Once I am done feeding and burping, its time to put her to sleep . Once that is done (around 4am) I am ready to go to bed to wake up at 7am in order to get Ashley up and prepared for school. I figure I may sleep a good 4 hrs a day (Not good at All). I have also chosen to take this shift so that my wife can get some rest. In her nature she is an activist always trying to help or truly just needing to do something in order for her to feel productive (trust me between Ashley, Emmalee and I we give her more than enough to do). Just recently she has been suffering from vertigo and severe back pain and it is all rooted in what I call the "GINORMOUS " amount of constant stress she has been under since the 24th week of pregnancy. It breaks my heart to see her this way. I pray everyday that our God above give me/us the strength to continue forward. Oops, I almost forgot our other blessing, ASHLEY. She is a 5 year old big sister that unequivocally loves her sister with a passion and can't wait for her to start sitting up, laughing and walking so she can dress her, take her to the park and play beauty salon with her. What a blessing it is to have Ashley around, but how difficult it is sometimes to explain to her what it means for Emmalee (her cosita linda) to have special needs. I must say that at times while I am driving to a counseling session with a client or on my way to go preach I start to compare or create a parallel between where Emmalee is up to developmentally at 7 months (really four months because she is a premie) and how and what Ashley was doing at that age. It is hard to swallow the gigantic differences in their growth process. It is also hurtful for me to see some of my close friends with their 7 month olds and all the different things they are capable of doing verses were Emmalee Grace and her limitations. Oh boy.... What a lulu!

Well friends, "that's my spiel and I am stick'n to it"

The Contreras Family (Daddy)