Sunday, November 02, 2008

Amazing...

WARNING: this post contains sensitive material.  
Okay, I am continually amazed by the way God has created our bodies, and babies and mommies, there are so many things that have fascinated me this past week and a half.  One of the things that they do in the hospital when you have a newborn is administer a Vitamin K shot, which helps newborns with blood clotting.  We had decided to go ahead and get the Vitamin K shot (we opted out of the eye goop, and the hep B vaccine) since we knew that Ezra would be getting circumcised.  No real medical reason, just thought he would prefer being like Daddy and brothers.  Anyway, getting a vitamin K shot proved to be a difficult task.  They don't have it at the pediatrician's office, the hospital won't administer it unless we took Ezra to the Emergency Room, and none of the pharmacies carry it.  After some further research and a very helpful talk with a midwife, we came to the conclusion that the actual benefits of this shot compared to the risks were not worth all the effort we were going to in order to get Ezra this shot.  This is the interesting part:
When babies are born, they do not have the full amount of clotting factor... well, this can be a problem in some babies, but for most, it is not.  Our pediatrician explained that it is because they have not yet fully built up the "good bacteria" within their intestinal systems.  But listen to this!!!  Not only is there a higher concentration of Vitamin K in the colostrum (the stuff just before your milk comes in), but after the first week of life, the baby has built up sufficient amounts of the "good bacteria" to be able to clot on their own.   The midwife specifically put it this way, that the baby has sufficient clotting ability by the eighth day.  Now, perhaps that isn't super significant yet... but, in Biblical times, boys were circumcised on the eighth day!!!!  And, not only did this just completely amaze me, how God perfectly designed that all to fit together, but before knowing any of this information, we had made an appointment to have Ezra's circumcision done, and do you know when his appointment had fallen???  On the EIGHTH day. I'm not even kidding!!  Ben and I were talking about how God told the Israelites to circumcise on the eighth day, and He didn't necessarily spell out WHY he told them that, He just expected them to obey.  And it was for their good!!  
Anyway, I am just in awe of all this, and although it may not interest everyone else the same way, it tickled me enough to blog about it.
P.S.  Ezra is doing very well since his circumcision, and healing up just fine.  His doctor said there was very little bleeding.  Yeah God!

4 comments:

Courtney said...

I just love those kind of "coincidences." They are great reminders of how awesome our God is!

Christine H. said...

Okay, that is SO COOL!

Tonya said...

I am always amazed by all the coincidences we think there are but God has been in control the whole time and HE knew and knows EVERYTHING! Thanks for sharing.

sarahgrace said...

Praise God for that and taking care of all of us so fully and completely!

Gotta wonder if there is even MORE to having them done on the eighth day- it'd be really interesting to do research and see if they had a higher pain tolerance or something as well on just that day.