Change of plans

I am assuming that by now most of you have heard what has happened. For those of you who may not have I will try and briefly sum up. Thursday morning (Wednesday night) at 3:00am the Mary Jane's water broke. We rushed to the hospital where they quickly started her on a steroid treatment, and began to give her antibiotics and drugs designed to calm down the uterus and try to prevent her from going into full blown labor. They did a number of tests (ultrasounds etc.) and found that it was the baby formally known as "baby a" whose sack had ruptured and that the baby formally known as "baby b" was still intact. Both babies are healthy, however things are less sterile and not ideal for "baby a".
(somewhere in all this we decided that the baby a and baby b thing needed to go. We've known names for a while but were going to have fun on the blog with people guessing the names...the time for that has passed by. Baby "a" is Mary Parker Broge, although we will be calling her "Parker" most of the time. Baby "b" is Emma Jane Broge, and she will be referred most to most frequently as Emma Jane, (although her mother wants it known that Emma is acceptable))

It was quickly decided that we needed to move hospitals and be at BJC, the adult hospital which is attached to Mary Jane's hospital (St. Louis Children's hospital) because that will be a better place for the girls to be after they are born.
Since then we have pretty much been in a holding pattern. Mary Jane is on complete bedrest. She can't get up for anything. The goal is to try to keep Parker and Emma Jane in for as long as possible.
Things are going "smoothly" now. Yesterday was very scary, and there were some points where I was really scared for Mary Jane's health as well, but she is doing much better now. Now the goal is just to wait. How long? As long as possible. The babies are 26 week today. That is way too early to be born, but they are viable. Being born now would be full of risks both for their life and their long term health. The longer they can stay in the better things will be for them. The first big window is 48 hours (which will be 4 am Friday morning) this gives the steroids the chance to help their lungs develop some. How long can this go on? No one knows. Mary Jane could go into full blown labor in five minutes, five days, or five weeks. The chances are probably significantly higher for the five days then the five weeks, but we just can't know. Only the Lord knows the day and the hour.
When the time comes things will likely happen very quickly. Parker is breech and is closest, so they will need to quickly do an emergency c-section. Until that moment we sit (or in the case of Mary Jane lie) on pins and needles and pray. We pray for the mercy of God our Father. We pray for his hand of protection upon Parker and Emma Jane. We pray that every minute they remain in the womb would be full of extra knitting to prepare them for the outside world. We pray for wisdom for the doctors, the nurses, and the staff taking care of Mary Jane and the girls. As we do this we inevitably wonder why, but there will never be answers to those questions. Instead we cling to the cross of Christ. We cling to the hope which comes to us from the Son of God whose death and resurrection has claimed us as his in baptism (oh, yes...you better believe they will be baptized as soon as they are born).

As we go through, this we are overwhelmed by the love and support we have been shown. Our friends and family have shown us the love of Christ in their willingness to serve us in this midst of this crisis. We would like to thank all of our family for their prayer and support, everyone from our small group, everyone Mary Jane works with, all of our friends around the country, all those supporting us at Webster Gardens (my field work church) and the all of those who have so warmly embraced us during this crisis at Salem Church and school (my vicarage church). Thank you for your prayers, your love, and your support.
That said we are going to ask that you do not try to visit this weekend. It is important for Mary Jane to remain calm this weekend. Your e-mails, and texts, are appreciated and bring love and cheer. If you need to call please call through me, this just makes sure Mary Jane is not being woken up or anything. After Monday we will reevaluate visitors based on how Mary Jane is doing. At that time, if Mary Jane is going to be here for a while she would most likely need some of those visits, but in order to make sure things don't get overwhelming I am asking you call me first. That way I can spread things out for her and run interference if she's not feeling well enough for visitors. Thank you for your understanding.
I also thank you for all of your offers of help during this time. Mary Jane's mom is in town right now, and a friend is here (Emily was already planning to visit) for the weekend. So right now we have some people to help us through the weekend. However there will likely be a lot of help needed in the days, weeks, and months to come, and we are very appreciative for all the offers of to help we've already received.

Continue to check here at the website for updates. Generally no news is good news. My cell phone is 314-629-2022.

blessings,
Jason