Sprout’s Birth Story

Seeing as we are less than three weeks, maybe even only a few days, away from meeting our precious baby #3, Poppy, I thought now might be a good time to write up Sprout’s birth story. I’ve been thinking a lot about the birth of both Chickadee and Sprout and how God watched over us during their unexpected deliveries and those first few beautiful hours and days in the hospital as He grew our family. You can read about Chickadee’s birth story here. Adding Sprout was a little bit more crazy but just as wonderful!

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Sprout, was such an amazing surprise in so many ways. We found, a little unexpectedly, in September of 2014 when his sister was just 10 months old that his small life had begun. I was nursing and while I knew it was possible to become pregnant, I just didn’t think it was likely. It was exciting and overwhelming, but we knew God’s hand was on his life from the beginning. As if things were not already about to get crazy for us with two well under two years old, we also moved into our new house when I was 33 weeks pregnant.

We knew I was at risk for preterm labor, but since your sister was born at 37.5 weeks, we thought we had some time to get settled. However, around 34.5 weeks I thought I was having contractions in my back. The doctors ran some non-stress tests and assured me from what they could tell all was well and he was still happy and baking. You surprised them too!

The next day, April 10th we went to bed praying my back pain would cease. I said to III that we needed to come up with a plan for Chickadee (we have no family in town) in case Sprout decided to come earlier than expected. He said we would figure it out the next day. Well….around 12:30am he decided he was ready & my water broke on the way back from the bathroom! This led to the most intense contractions that seemed to never stop. We called several friends and finally Katie, from our small group, picked up (it was the middle of the night :/). She headed over to sit at the house with Chickadee until aunt Rachel (she was the closest!) could get here from Alabama. III packed a bag of the most random things, luckily the camera made it, and as soon as Katie pulled in we headed to the hospital excited and nervous to meet our newest little one! Honestly the contractions were so intense that I was convinced I was going to give birth in the car on the way to the hospital, but thankfully we made it in plenty of time.

I continued to battle pretty bad contractions (med-free) until they were ready to begin the c-section (he was breech like his sister) around 4:30am. As they were prepping me for surgery, his heart rate dropped to 50bpm and everything became very urgent.

The doctors began to move very quickly and Sprout was born within minutes at 5:06am. We were ecstatic to learn we had a healthy baby BOY! Sprout is named after his great grandfather, grandfather, & daddy. There were some concerns with baby boy being 5+ weeks early. However, we were at ease once we knew his lungs were strong & he was a good size for less than 35 weeks. He weighed in at 5lbs 13oz and was 19.5 inches long. He did have to make a precautionary trip to the NICU due to his earliness. I wasn’t able to see him for almost 12 hours and it was heart wrenching. Luckily, lots of family had made it to Atlanta and he was surrounded by his daddy, grandparents, and aunts & uncle getting lots of love.

Later that night I was finally able to hold him in my arms, and sweet boy my heart grew even bigger. Sprout is such a gift and we are so thankful for how God watched over all of us that day. Our NICU stay was short as Sprout made great progress really quickly. The nurses were great, very encouraging, and loved on him when we couldn’t be there ourselves. He was able to come home a week to the day after he was born. We are so blessed by our little man, and we know that God has had his hand on him from the beginning.

His is still so smiley, expressive, and loves to snuggle. God has worked in his life already and blessed us to the fullest these past two years! We pray that one day our Sprout will move mountains for the Lord. We love you baby boy!

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