Thanksgiving-My First Born

This one is an all emotional post about Jackson. Does anyone out there feel as they get older, live through more, have kids you have become a more emotional person? I have for sure it's a little scary for a person who isn't very emotional.

Jackson was born on May 16, 2007 at 4:59 am. My personal goal for having him out was 5:00 am so I cut it close! My life was forever changed in that moment. While I carried him I loved him but when I met him in the flesh and held him my love grew deeper. He was absolutely beautiful.

The first few months with Jackson were crazy. I had no idea what I was doing and then on August 1, 2007 Jackson woke up from a nap with a fever and wouldn't eat. I was really nervous so I called the doctor and they said we should take him to the E.R. There they decided Jackson had pneumonia which was really scary at the age of 10 weeks. He was admitted and just a couple days later he was rushed to DeVos Children's Hospital and after 30 hours or so at DeVos he was air lifted to Children's Memorial in Chicago. These were probably the scariest few days of my life. I remember holding Jackson at DeVos and sobbing with him, begging God to let me trade places with Jackson.

Jackson was diagnosed with Acute liver failure and listed as a status 1a for a liver transplant.
Acute Liver Failure - (a def taken from a medical dictionary) Acute liver failure often affects young people and carries a very high mortality.

Status 1 (acute severe disease) is defined as a patient with only recent development of liver disease who is in the intensive care unit of the hospital with a life expectancy without a liver transplant of fewer than 7 days

When I read those definitions I can't believe how close I actually was to losing my son. One of the doctors at Children's actually did sit Matt and I down and said, "I want to make sure you know that your son could die from this you know the severity of the situation," those are words no parent should ever hear and they are definitely your biggest fear as a parent. I cannot wake up in the morning THANKFUL enough for this little miracle. He truly is a miracle and I am so extremely thankful that I get to see, hold, hug, kiss, laugh, tickle, play, and just enjoy Jackson every day. Jackson isn't perfect and he is a normal 3 year old boy getting into trouble but he brings so much JOY to my life. There is no greater joy to me in my life than being a mom and Jackson was my first baby, he made me a MOM!!!!! So today I am thankful for my miracle, Jackson Alan, thank you God for the last 3 years and many more to come.