the longest 5 days of my life

it all started monday when we woke up and madeline felt a little bit warm. i chalked it up to being wrapped too tight or sleeping on someone. as the day wore on and she still felt hot, i took her temperature. it was 99.4. not too bad but still not good in a 6 day old baby. so i called the pediatrician and they said to bring her in. so i did. the doctor said that she looked fine and that most likely the cause was being too hot on a warm day, but he suggested that they check her temperature rectally to make sure (when we got there they took in under her arm and was 100.4). well the nurse did and it was 101.4... way too hot for an infant. so the doctor sent us over to the hospital. he said that they were going to run some tests. in my mind this meant, do tests. us go home. well not in hospital land. they first told us that we would stay while they did the tests. then it tuned into 48 hours to have the cultures grow... with out going in to great boring detail... we were there for 5 days while they ruled out a lot. the final diagnosis was viral meningitis. now i will say that i still have no idea exactly what that is. i have not looked it up and i am not sure that i want to. i just knew that my baby was sick and she needed to get better.
during this time there was a lot that i learned. many of which i hope NEVER to use again... like how to diaper a screaming baby with 5 cords attached to her, how to read the monitor attached to all of those cords, and which lights and buzzers to ignore and which ones will have the nurse in your room pretty quick. but during this time, i felt a peace and calm that i know only came from the Lord. i was never really worried that she was not going to be ok. i just knew that this was something that we had to fight.
i also felt all of the support from the many friends and family praying for us. i felt the love from so many calls and texts that i could not even answer them all. i am truly thankful for the support. knowing that there were so many people out there that cared for us really did make it easier to get through the long days.
it always amazes me how much closer to the Lord i feel when tragic things happen. hopefully i can put into practice what mike (our pastor says) "Lord please humble me by your presence and not by my circumstances" if only i can learn to practice that and never have to go through something like this again!

i really did not want to take pictures, i already knew it was something i would never forget... but what is a blog with out a picture?