(From November 2008)
Last night I shared my testimony at the Thanksgiving Eve service, with
our church here in Manhattan, Grace Baptist. It was very emotional
however, God gave me the strength in between tears to read the whole
story myself. I did have my brother Wade up front with me for support
and to take over reading if needed. Ben also made a slideshow to show
Ellie's journey - and it has the song, Loving You Eternally that I
posted about before. --> (See link at bottom of this page)
Please know that we are forever thankful for your prayers for our Little
Ellie. This Thanksgiving means so much to us this year. Thanks for
taking this journey with Team Gramkow.
____________________________________________________________________
My name is Mandy Gramkow and I am going to share with you a glimpse of
why this Thanksgiving means so much to my husband Ben and I. Ben
couldn’t be here because he is with our little Ellie (who has a very
weak immunity) at home. I have asked my brother, Wade to help me read
our story if I am to get too emotional…and for those of you who know
me…it’s likely.
We are thankful…
I remember thinking right after we Gramkows found out we were pregnant –
that I really hoped that this little one would draw me closer to God.
Little did I know the path that He would choose for our family. We are
so thankful that God chose us to be parents, to give us the desire of
our hearts – however, we had no idea that we would become parents on His
timeline – 3 months early.
September 3 is a day that I will never forget as our world was turned
upside down. I had a rough week physically leading up to that day and
moved my doctor’s appointment up. My visit lasted short of what seemed
to be 5 minutes as my doctor hurriedly told us to get to the hospital. I
was 5 cm dilated and 100% effaced. I was laboring at 28 weeks and would
be life-flighted to Topeka.
God’s comfort and peace was very apparent that day. I got the first of
three suggested shots to help mature the baby’s lungs here in Manhattan.
I remember having a peace about me as I flew in the helicopter with the
flight crew the 23 minutes it took to get to Stormont-Vail. It wasn’t
me remaining calm, God was with me. God provided a friend to drive Ben,
my husband to Topeka, as really…we had no idea what was about to happen.
I guess in times like this – you reach a point of complete surrender
and trust because honestly, we didn’t have time to really think.
When I got to Topeka, the accepting physician said that he wasn’t going
to wait for me to deliver in the room. He decided to break my water and
have the neonatologist team there and ready. So little time! I was asked
to get ready to deliver, but wait – we had our childbirth classes
scheduled for October 6. We thought we had more time. The doctor checked
the baby’s positioning and determined that the baby was breech so he
called an emergency C-section. Another panic moment, where again, I had a
peace and just wanted to do what’s best for the baby. My brother Wade
happened to be in Topeka that day and was there with me until Ben
arrived.
They gave me general anesthesia and when I came too, faithful nurse
Peggy, who had been with me since I got off the helicopter, and told me
that we had a little girl. I thought for sure that it was a little boy
causing all this drama.
Ben had followed our little 2 pound, 8 oz.
baby girl, Ellie Jo, to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. I knew a NICU
probably existed, and had heard about premature babies, but boy, the
first few days at the hospital learning about our little Ellie’s
condition – I had no idea how fragile this little life was. Ellie’s eyes
were both still sealed shut, she had severe bruising on her head and
face, and was immediately placed in an isolette to keep her warm.
Her
skin was paper thin and sticky. Her little ears were also like paper
and plastered to her head. Ben and I are life-long students, but this
was a course like none before. Why me? Why us – this is our first baby,
we’re both busy graduate students, this just isn’t the way it’s supposed
to happen. Apparently God trusts us and knew we could handle it. Oh
that’s a hard lesson to really grasp – and I’m still learning to grasp
it.
From day one, we had to remind ourselves that this was part of God’s
plan and Ellie just couldn’t wait to meet us. Not everyone gets to see
on the outside the amazing miracle of life and the development of a baby
during the last trimester. We had to wait three days just to hold our
little girl for 6 minutes because she couldn’t tolerate too much
stimulation. What a hard lesson to learn too – when you can see your
baby lying there, but can’t do the things that moms are supposed to get
to do.
I couldn’t handle it on my own strength;
Ben and I were
constantly drawn to our knees seeking God to carry us in this time of
waiting. Talk about learning a lesson on the sovereignty of God! He was
in control. We couldn’t do anything but stand by our little girl’s side
and watch the Lord’s amazing work. Ellie was off the ventilator after
day 2 and you had only had one of the three shots. Her first feeding of
breast milk was 2.5 mL on day 3. (there are 30 ml in one ounce) Each
day she amazed us more and more. God protected Ellie from infection and
some potentially major bowel diseases. It’s a lot to ask a little
premature baby to start eating, using her bowels, using her lungs – all
things that were supposed to mature in the womb – until tomorrow – Yep,
my due date was originally November 27, Thanksgiving Day.
This whole
experience has put a new perspective on being thankful.
I can’t even list all of the times where I was moved to tears because of
how the Lord provided. But I will try to share a few.
1. Ellie was born under 1200 grams which qualified her for a medical
card or Medicaid. This meant that her NICU bills would be covered 100%. I
remember hyperventilating the day we had our care conference with the
medical team and social worker and hearing that news. God knew. He knew
what he was doing and he’s provided. The cost of Ellie’s care has
already totaled in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Our cost was
emotion and trust.
We are thankful.
2. God provided a place for us to stay - I’m sure you’ve all heard of
the Ronald McDonald hous – but maybe never realized what they did until
you have someone need it. It was a huge blessing to be so close to the
hospital. God provided for us as we never had to pay our rent there once
because of His giving people.
We are thankful.
3. We found a temporary church home in Topkea. What a blessing to be a
part of the body of Christ – every sermon spoke to us in a different
way, the worship was just what I needed to comfort my heart. There were
people from Topkea Bible Church that didn’t even know us (just friends
of friends, etc.) that were praying for our little Ellie. They made
meals and brought them to Ronnie’s, they sent us notes of encouragement,
they helped pay for our rent at Ronnie’s.
We are thankful.
4. We received numerous gifts, notes of encouragement, and meals, from
this church – Grace Baptist – some of you I had never met, but am so
grateful that you took the time to write us – whether it was scripture
or a success story of a premature birth in the family. We needed to hear
those things from you. It was a comfort knowing that people at home
were also praying for Ellie and providing for our immediate physical
needs. Thank you for responding to God’s prompting to reach out to us.
We are thankful.
5. Ben and I are on track to graduate with master’s degrees, K-State was
great in allowing us to work from a distance on our classes. I work
with and for amazing people at the Jardine Apartments with K-State
Housing and Dining, and they too were able to work a plan out for me to
work from a distance. Now that we are home we are playing a lot of
catch-up, but still…
We are thankful.
6. We were blessed to have an amazing medical staff at Stormont-Vail
care for our little princess. She spent 71 days with her NICU family.
They spent countless hours explaining to Ben and I her progress,
answering our endless list of questions, reminding us that “she’s not
even supposed to be here yet.” Thank you God for motivating
compassionate people to learn about little babies and how to help them
thrive in their prematurity.
We are thankful.
7. November 13 – after 71 days in the NICU we were able to bring our little Ellie home – all 6 lbs. and 7 oz. of her!
We are thankful.
8. We worship and choose to follow an amazing, creative God. He has
carried us, all three of us, through the past chapter in our life and
we’re so glad he’ll continue to be by our side. Ellie is a precious gift
to us and we pray that people were and are able to see Jesus through
her story and fight for life. We pray that she chooses to love Him and
we can’t wait to share with her how God was right by her side from day
one.
Thank you God.
We are forever thankful.
Well, Team Gramkow sure has had a lot of fun hanging out as a family. We are very grateful for each other and SMILES! Ellie's eating patterns are still low, from what we see. She's averaging 45-50 mLs per day. We'd like her to be eating more, but I guess as long as she's still gaining weight, that's what matters. Yesterday we had the social worker from the Infant-Toddler program come and collect information about Ellie. This is a program provided by the Riley County Health Department, that will help us help Ellie's growth and development. They are a team of occupational therapist, speech therapist, physical therapist, social worker, etc. We're pretty thankful there are programs like this out there to help educate us as how to best care for Ellie. Oh, and we're back in Topeka on Monday for her eye exam with Dr. Warren who is a retinal specialist. This is to check out her for ROP or the vessels behind her retina. The vessels still are showing prematurity. I think this will be a longer road - finding out about her sight...just because things are still showing "premature" and rightfully so because she was premature.
Here are some fun pictures from the past couple days!
Ben got christened...yep, she obviously didn't tolerate any of this feeding...sure makes you feel so sad, but at the same time, were in such amazement that so much came out of such a little person, we had to take a picture!
Grandma and Grandpas have special privileges. Grandma and Grandpa Gramkow stopped to hold Ellie for the first time on their way back from their Thanksgiving Dinner.
Here is a picture of Ellie 1 day adjusted age. This adjusted age started from her due date, Nov.27 and this is the "date" we'll use for her growth and development, even though she'll almost technically be 3 months old this week!
