Filling up

Filling up our gas tank is something we all do quite frequently. It seems like we are doing it more this home assignment because we are traveling more. But one thing we’ve learned is that this is exactly what home assignment is all about--filling up our tanks. It’s not about our gas tank, but about our spiritual, relational and emotional tanks.

Living in a different culture, speaking a difficult language, attempting to minister to lost souls while maintaining your own can be draining. When we arrived on United States soil, we felt like we were running on fumes. Two months into our home assignment though, we are noticing the gauge on our tanks is steadily rising.

Invitations to play a round of frisbee golf or homerun derby, going to playgroups, sharing meals with family, shopping with the girls, seeing grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins all play with Kayleigh, going to baseball games and watching the NBA finals with friends (even if our teams always lose) have all helped fill our tanks.

Recently, we have been filled up through our presentations. So far we’ve had the opportunity to share with some of our supporters, elders/staff at Maryland Community Church, Beardstown Christian Academy, and a small group. Each meeting has revived us and given us more passion to see Taiwanese people come to the Lord. Many have asked questions about our life and ministry in Taiwan and even spoken some encouraging words that have been a fuel our souls needed.

We can’t begin to thank the Lord enough for the ways that we have been encouraged the past two months. We know that when August 30th rolls around and we board the plane bound for Taiwan, our tanks will be overflowing. Because the Lord has used you to encourage us and excite us about our next term in Taiwan.

Birth of Kayleigh Elizabeth Hampton

Well, since Kayleigh is 6 weeks old today, I thought it was probably time to update the blog with her birth story. It seems like a lifetime ago, but I'll do my best to remember. This will just be a very shortened version, maybe someday I'll have the time to write the full version.

We (Lance and myself plus my mom) headed to the hospital on Wed, Nov 24th at 10 am for an induction. It took awhile for some preliminary things to be done, but I think we started the Pitocin before noon.

The Pitocin is started and it didn't take long for the contractions to start. They were pretty erratic in the beginning but then they came regularly every 3-5 mins. Oh, and take note of the lovely gowns they give you. :)
This is after one of MANY walks around the Labor and Delivery floor. I'm guessing this was sometime on Wed because I still cared about trying to look good for pictures. But by Thursday, I didn't care much about what I looked like. Thursday night we celebrated Thanksgiving in this room and thanks to Brenda we had a small Thanksgiving meal (turkey, mashed potatoes, rolls and cranberry sauce). But I have to admit, I didn't really feel like eating much. By this time, I'd been having contractions for about 36 hours. My constant prayer was that at each check I would be at 3 cm. (3 cm was the magic number for the wonderful world of pain relief--an epidural.) But each exam would have the same result: 1 lousy cm. I think by Friday morning the doctor told me I was barely 2 cm. But after 48 hours of torture, I begged the doctor for a c-section.

This picture really makes me laugh. At this point, I have had the spinal tap, and I'm really feeling the effects. One of which was constant gagging. I wasn't actually throwing up, but it was the weirdest sensation. It was like I was fake gagging. And after every "gag" I would start giggling uncontrollably because it just felt weird--and I'm sure it looked pretty silly. Eventually that stopped and the surgery began. Technically in Taiwan, the husband isn't allowed in the operating room, but our doctor pulled some strings and let him be there. I was SO grateful Lance could be there with me to experience Kayleigh's birth.

This is my first look at my daughter. What an amazing moment. Lance was able to hold her and I was so jealous! I was desperate to reach out and touch her. Thankfully, before they took her away, the nurse rubbed her face against mine. I remember the tears streaming down my cheeks. What a beautiful thing, to touch your baby for the first time.

Kayleigh ended up having some breathing difficulties because of "wet lungs." Sometimes when babies are born via cesarean, they have fluid on their lungs. Most babies when delivered naturally, the fluid in their lungs is squeezed out as they travel through the birth canal. But since Kayleigh was born via c-section, her lungs didn't have the opportunity to get rid of the extra fluid.

Just before they wheeled me off to the Recovery Room, my doctor told me they were taking Kayleigh to the NICU. Then I was whisked away without knowing the details of what was wrong. I'm not sure how long I was in Recovery, but it seemed like days. This was actually worse than the 48 hours of labor. I was so anxious to get back to Lance and find out how Kayleigh was. I actually wasn't even able to see her again that day. The NICU visiting hours were twice a day for 30 mins. That evening, Lance and my mom went to see her, but I couldn't go because I was still recovering from the surgery. This was also a low point. I had to stay and wait in my room while they got to go see our baby. It was a long half hour wait. But they brought back good reports from the dr and some pictures and videos for me to see. This was all the motivation I needed to get up out of bed and start moving around. I NEEDED to see my baby at the next visiting hours the following morning.
So at 10:30 am, 24 hours later, I was finally able to hold my baby girl. And by now, she wasn't even on round the clock oxygen. She was already improving.
The next day, Kayleigh was moved to the Sick Baby Room, a step down from the NICU. But the visiting hours were the same, twice a day for 30 mins. Although I was able to go down and feed Kayleigh several times a day while she was in the SBR. But each time we had to leave her and go back to my room, it was really sad. This is one of my favorite pictures, here Lance is saying goodbye for now.
Thirty minutes just goes by too quickly! By Sunday, Kayleigh was doing great. Her doctors said that whenever I was released she could go home too. So I begged the doctor to release me early. (In Taiwan, after a c-section, the mother stays in the hospital for 7 days.) On Monday, my doctor gave me the ok to go home. We were so excited to spend more than an hour a day with our baby!
As excited as we were, she was just content to sleep!
Yay! We're FINALLY home!

Baby Update

Well, our baby decided not to be a part of the 5% of babies that come on their actual due date! So we had our regularly scheduled weekly appointment today. We did another non-stress test today and it went similarly to last week. For the first 20 mins, she was sleeping and didn’t move at all. But after some prodding and pushing on my stomach by the doctor, she woke up and they were able to record her movements and heart rate. And it seems that she is still doing ok in there.

Then we went down to see Dr. Huang. She checked the baby on the ultrasound and said her guess is that the baby is weighing in around 8 lbs. But for the entire pregnancy, the baby has measured one week farther along than her gestational age, so we could’ve been a little off on the due date. Because of that, the dr would like to induce this Wed. So at 9 am, we’ll go in to the Labor and Delivery floor and they’ll give me a shot of pitocin to induce labor and we’ll see what happens. If I haven’t made any progress and there’s still no baby on Friday she’ll likely want to perform a cesarean. So we’re praying that the pitocin will be just enough to kick start labor so we’re not just waiting around for three days at the hospital with nothing happening and then have to have a c-section.

We’ll try to keep you updated from the hospital as best we can. We’re told that the 8th floor (where we’ll be after the baby is born) has wi-fi. But we tried it today from the 7th floor (the labor and delivery floor) and didn’t have any luck. So we’ll do our best!

Due-Date Eve...

it's the night before our due date and it's really got me reflecting on the past 9 months. if you've been around me much at all (especially if your my poor husband) you know that the last 40 weeks have not been easy on me. i always thought that being pregnant would be this magical time of awe and wonder, a time when life was at it's grandest and you felt like you were walking on top of the clouds. and please, don't hear my wrong, i do believe that this is a time of awe and wonder--a tiny human being has formed and grown inside me. when i think of this i can't help but KNOW that there is a Divine Creator who put this all in motion. and in those moments i couldn't be happier that i'm pregnant. and while it is a true miracle from God, it doesn't mean that my body has loved every minute of the past 280 days. but tonight, i started thinking about things i would miss about being pregnant. before i get to that list, let me just share a few of the things i won't miss...

• frequently visiting the toilet (sitting ON it or hovering OVER it)
• people not making eye contact with me, just staring at my middle
• leaving trash, crumbs, or even important objects i need on the floor when i drop them, b/c i can't bend over to get them
• not being able to shave my legs
• riding the "once you get on you can never get off" emotional roller coaster
• waddling slowly behind friends as they walk at a normal pace
• cankles

i realized those are silly and trivial, but all things i won't miss about being pregnant. here's the good list... things i'll miss about pregnancy...

• not feeling guilty about taking a nap (in the morning and afternoon!)
• stretchy elastic-waist pants without zippers
• watching my stomach dance around with the movements of our baby girl
• not feeling like i have to "suck it in" all the time
• dreaming about what she'll look like, wondering who's eyes, mouth, nose... she'll have
• feeling her many bouts of hiccups
• experiencing the outpour of love from our friends and family making sure we have everything she needs
• knowing that a miracle is happening INSIDE of me

those are my random thoughts on our due-date eve. i will be happy to not to experience the things on my first list, but it makes me even happier knowing that soon we will be holding our special baby girl in our arms.

baby hampton update

Well we’ve made it to 39 weeks! We went in today for our appt with Dr Huang. She first had us go up to the Labor and Delivery floor for a fetal non-stress test. It took about 30 mins and they measure the baby’s heart rate and movements and also for contractions. I was nervous in the beginning that they would make us come back and do it again, b/c she just wasn’t moving. This was right after lunch and Lance thought maybe the warm potato soup I had for lunch just made her really sleepy. :) But during the last half of the test, she really started to perk up with lots of big movements and with each movement her heart rate jump up and then come back down (which is what they hope to see). So she passed with flying colors. And in the last few minutes of the test, I also had good sized contraction.

During the test they put us in the labor room, and behind the next curtain over, a lady was in labor with contractions coming pretty quickly. I’m not sure how long she’d been there, but we’d only been there about 5 mins before she had had enough, saying “I can’t take it anymore!” and was begging for the drugs. Lance silently chuckled, but I did none of that—I know it will be my turn soon. :)

Then we went down for our scheduled appt with Dr Huang. She was pleased with the results of the NST and wanted to check the baby on the ultrasound. She said the baby had dropped down a lot since last week, so much so that it was difficult for her to get a head measurement (which helps her determine size and weight). She thought the baby was around 7.7 lbs, but it’s anyone’s guess at this point. And there was a little bit of good news about her position. She’s made a slight turn and is looking more towards my side, so the Dr encouraged me to lay on my right side as much as I can to help her make the turn the rest of the way.

Sunday is the due date and while I pray my baby is a good girl and arrives on her due date, I know that only 5% of all babies actually arrive on their due date. :) So, the Dr said if she doesn’t see me earlier, then I need to come in next Monday and we can make a plan of where to go from there. But she was thinking if we didn’t have the baby by Monday, we could induce Tues or Wed. Keep praying that the baby fully turns over and looks toward my spine. You can also pray for my mom who leaves Wed at 6 am and arrives in Taiwan Thurs pm (Thurs am IL time).

That’s what we know for now! We’ll definitely keep you posted! Thanks for praying!

a waiting game

one thing i've realized is that the entire 9 months of pregnancy is a waiting game. we had to wait to hear the heartbeat for the first time, see the first sonogram picture, find out the sex of the baby, and now we wait for the baby to decide to make her appearance. honestly, it's quite maddening to me. i like to make plans. i don't really like to fly by the seat of my pants. i'm not very spontaneous. but there's no making plans for delivery. we just have to wait on her. and something i've learned over the past 9 months is i'm not a very good wait-er. i'm praying that i can be patient over the next few weeks and enjoy the home stretch. (as much as you can enjoy the last weeks of pregnancy!)

Global Rest Retreat

We recently had the opportunity to attend a Global Rest retreat with some fellow Team Expansion coworkers in Kenting, Taiwan. Kenting is a beach town on the southern coast. Originally the plan was for us all to rent a charter bus, but in the end a few families couldn't come and it didn't seem worth the cost to go that route.So it was every man for himself to make the trip down (about 4 hours from Taichung). When we realizedthis, we knew it was time to step up our car search. Thankfully the week before the retreat we were able to purchase a new (to us) car. It ran very well and was very comfortable. We were so excited to be able to take this first road trip in our new car.

We were blessed in a variety of ways on this trip. One of the ways was our hotel. Usually these kinds of retreats are spent at hostels or retreat centers, but because of some special connections, we were able to have the retreat at the Howard Beach Resort. It was a nice change from the hotels we're used to staying at! :) Our room was huge and had a decent view of the ocean. It was a very comfortable place to spend the week.

The Howard Beach Resort

The view from our hotel room

We were also blessed by the team who came from the States to lead us. Every morning we were led in worship (in English!), and heard the Word (in English!). This was a highlight to us. Being "newbies" still in Chinese, we crave for times of being fed and worshiping in English. We do participate in our weekend Chinese services, but there is something quite special about worshiping in your mother tongue.

This week away (just a short time before the birth of our first child) was also a blessing to our marriage. We were able to have some long talks and share some hopes and dreams with each other, that sometimes aren't always possible with the day to day life routines. We also had the chance to play a lot of cards with each other on rainy afternoons and play games with friends in the evenings.

I (Kimberly) was especially excited about the retreat b/c I absolutely love the beach. I love the sights, sounds, and smells. Unfortunately it rained nearly every day! I did get to the pool on the first day, but it was quite windy and cloudy that day. On the last day of the retreat, Lance and I walked down to the beach, but didn't even bother with our beach gear b/c we knew the rain wasn't going to hold off much longer. But it was nice to spend an hour walking and sitting along the shore--even if it was cloudy and overcast.

On the last day of the retreat, the teams from the US shared some incredible news with us. They had raised extra money for the retreat, and it ended up being enough to cover the cost of the hotel! We didn't have to pay for any of our lodging! What a blessing this was to each of us! In fact, the only things we had to pay for during the week was our gas down and back and our evening meals. This was such wonderful news! Thanks Global Rest for a great week of rest and refreshment!