Bringing You Up To Speed...

We just created this blog site to keep everyone updated on Jonas and Canan.  In order to get you up to speed, I'm reposting some old blogs that I had up on other sites (myspace, facebook, etc.) so that you can read up on the full epic story of our two boys!  The following was originally posted on September 21, 2008:

Before my wife was put on bedrest, we used to go on walks at 6 in the morning. One morning, around the time my wife and I started trying to have a baby, we were talking about starting a savings for our child's future. Money was tight and the only way to start saving for this, was to put away all of our change. Right after we decided this, I found a dime lying heads up on the sidewalk. This, we decided, would be the start of our firstborn's savings. Less than a minute later my wife looked down and found another dime heads up on the ground, a few yards away. We jokingly said, "Maybe we'll have twins", and never thought about it again...

...Until about 5 months ago.

The day before our fourth anniversary of marriage I decided to buy a pregnancy test for my wife. I had recorded a series of messages for her to listen to on her iPod throughout the next day while I was at work, which would lead her to different gifts I had given her. One of them would be the pregnancy test. That night I hid the test and went to bed praying that the results would be positive. I fell asleep very peaceful and happy after receiving a promise from God that she would be pregnant. Sure enough, the night of our anniversary was the night we found out we were going to be parents.

A couple weeks later, her OBGYN had to do an ultrasound to find out how far along Bethany was in her pregnancy. The very first thing the ultrasound technician said to us was "Uhh...... Have you used any fertility medications?" Of course we hadn't, but we knew what this meant. The technician confirmed it and said there were two heartbeats. The first thought that came to my mind was that I needed a new job! That first day was quite a blow to my mind, but after the shock went away I became very excited. Later we found out that the twins are identical and are both boys.

Now we are about 23 weeks along and almost a week ago my wife was sentenced to bedrest in the hospital until we reach 28 weeks. That's a total of almost 6 weeks in the hospital! She's allowed out of her bed to go to the bathroom and I'm allowed to take her on a wheelchair ride for 30 minutes a day. Her uterus is already contracting which is causing her cervix to open up early. They put her on Nifedipine, which seems to be helping to stop the contractions and movement of the uterus. If she goes into early labor and the boys are born before we reach 24 weeks, there is almost no chance of their survival. If they are born between 24 and 28 weeks, there is a higher chance of survival, along with high chance of complications such as cerebral palsy and other things they can be born with. After 28 weeks, the chance of our babies being born healthy without any complications is much higher. So the goal of the hospital staff is to get us to 28 weeks.

The comforting part is that I don't have to rely on chance. I rely on God. almost a year ago my wife and I received a message that I now believe is from the Lord that we are going to have twins. Since then I have received more promises from God that our boys will both be healthy. It looks like our boys might be here a little sooner than we had planned, but we are both very excited to spend our first Christmas this year with our twins!

Jonas Christopher and Canon James, your mommy and daddy can't wait to see you both!