James

Today is the Feast of St. James. I was struggling with my meditation for today and finally set it aside last night because it was way past my bedtime and I kept hitting a mental block. But as I climbed into bed I realized I needed to share with you the miracles surrounding my nephew, James.

My sister Julie and I share a medical condition called antiphospholipid antibody syndrome. The antibodies cause blood clots to form and during pregnancy the clots can form in the placenta causing fetal death. This was the cause of my two miscarriages. After my sister had her miscarriage and with her history of a blood clot in her leg, I encouraged her to have her blood tested for the antibodies. Part of the management for this condition is to be placed on heparin and low dose aspirin (blood thinners) during the pregnancy. This will prevent the clots from forming but also puts the mother at risk for bleeding. This is an over simplification of a very complex condition. When my sister was 33 weeks pregnant she began having horrible right shoulder pain. When she went to see her doctor she was found to have pre-eclampsia and some other severe complications and they needed to induce labor. James was born weighing 3 lbs, was placed on a ventilator and taken to the NICU. My sister was discharged from the hospital a few days later, her symptoms resolving with the delivery of her baby, or so we thought. She began having the terrible pain in her shoulder again and was taken to the ER. A MRI showed a large bleed in her liver and it was on the verge of rupturing which would cause her to bleed to death. That night we were told she had a 50/50 chance of making it through the night. My sister survived the incident and slowly her liver healed. While my sister was in the ICU a friend wrote the following scripture in a card for me, “Whoever clings to me I will deliver; whoever knows my name I will set on high. All who call upon me I will answer; I will be with them in distress; I will deliver them and give them honor. With length of days I will satisfy them and show them my saving power.” (Psalm 91:14-16)

 After a month in the NICU, James was finally able to go home. He was hooked up to a monitor 24 hours a day to monitor his heart and breathing. One day my sister placed him in the bassinet after feeding him and a few minutes later the alarm went off, when she walked over to check on him he was blue. She had to perform CPR on her baby. Thank God they required her to learn it before they let James go home. She was able to get him breathing again even before the ambulance got there.

James was one of the reasons my mom was able to hang on so long after her diagnosis of colon cancer. She developed life-threatening complications after her second course of chemotherapy and had to stop treatment so we knew it was only a matter of time before it progressed. My mom was a different person around James, patient and joyful. As she was nearing death, she was so worried that he would not remember her. He wasn’t even 2 years old when she died. My family goes to “Mimi’s Garden” (the cemetery) every Friday and puts fresh flowers on the graves of her and my two brothers. Before they leave, he will lean over, kiss the headstone and tell Mimi goodnight. James has also been a Godsend for my dad through his grief. He watches him a couple afternoons a week. The other day, out of the blue, James looked at my dad and said, “Do you remember Mimi?” My dad said, “Of course I do.” James asked if they could go get her because he missed her, my dad said they couldn’t because she was in heaven, and he said, “That’s right, she is in heaven with God.”