HAPPY 6th BIRTHDAY, MATTHEW ISAIAH!

HAPPY 6th BIRTHDAY, MATTHEW ISAIAH GONZALEZ


Matthew Isaiah turned 6 years old today! What a blessing it is and such a miracle. I know that most people when their kids have a birthday, they are so happy and think back over the last year. Some people, like us, view each day and YEAR as MIRACLES given to us from GOD. Most of you probably know our sons miracle story, so I will only BRIEFLY give you some of what happened those early days of his little life. Our son was born after WONDERFUL 39 weeks of being in my body. It has always been such a blessing for me to carry my babies for 39 weeks. I KNOW how it is to lose babies before they are ready to be born. So, when we were pregnant with Matthew, we felt so blessed and happy, just ready for our baby. Our pregnancy was as perfect as the first pregnancy. We eagerly awaited his arrival and planned his c-section to happen on May 21, 2004. Wow, we were so excited and ready. On that morning, we got wheeled into the OR ready to have our baby and at 8:54am, our son MATTHEW ISAIAH was born…he was beautiful…he gave a CRY…they took him away to clean him up and as they were putting me under to finish me up, I heard someone say, “he is not changing color’…I didn’t know what that meant…until a nurse came into my recovery cubical and said, ‘where is Mr. Gonzalez? Your baby has a heart defect & serious lung damage and needs to be transferred NOW” and walked out. The next couple of hours were every parents NIGHTMARE…knowing that EVERYTHING was out of your control and you were given a prognosis from the pedi cardiologist that he “didn’t think he would make the transport” he was that critical…that your newborn baby was at a different hospital from me, the mommy and that he was undergoing emergency heart cath and open heart surgery at 8 hours old because they found out that he had a rare heart defect called TOTAL ANOMALOUS PULMONARY VENOUS RETURN (TAPVR)…unless you have been thru this, you have absolutely NO IDEA what we were thinking or feeling…I can’t even TELL you what kind of thoughts were going thru our head. All we could do is PRAY and ask others to PRAY for our son…and they DID…we had sooo much support and sooo many PRAYERS for this little boy from all over the world…I remember being given a private room when there were NO PRIVATE ROOMS on the post partum floor…and KNOWING that that happened because they felt things were not going to go well…I remember TRYING to use a pump to express milk and crying because I didn’t LIKE to use those !@#$$ pumps and HAVING to….and just praying and waiting for the phone calls from James to let me know how things were going during his surgery….and being told that it was SUPPOSE to be a 4 hour surgery but instead, because of excess bleeding, he had to go thru the surgery AGAIN to stop the bleeding and it took a total of 8 hours…of being wheeled into the PICU on a vent and the ECMO machine…a VERY sick little boy….the prognosis of UNKNOWN….of him being taken off ECMO at 5 days old and told that there was a 1% chance of survival (and that was being nice) because he was blue again…the color of purple/blue color…of watching and KNOWING that your beautiful baby boy could be GONE by the days’ end….of finally being able to hold your baby boy…of loving on him, talking to him and just PRAYING over him…and the memories continue to be BRIGHT and STRONG in my mind….we witnessed a MIRACLE that day when by the GRACE OF GOD, he DID NOT pass away like EVERYONE thought…that by the GRACE OF GOD, he continued to survive, defy and to PROVE every doctor wrong that because of that, doctors couldn’t GIVE me a prognosis for him because they NEVER knew what Matthew would DO! 98 days in the PICU….98 days of him fighting for his life and him DAZZLING the staff with his beautiful smile and spirit….

And THAT is our son MATTHEW….that is this little boys FIGHTING spirit. He has been just such an INSPIRATION for our family. He reminds us everyday of how PRECIOUS life is and how MIRACLES happen. We always have said that Matthew must have seen GOD because this little boy is so HAPPY all the time. That is how we explain his beautiful and happy spirit. He has already SEEN such a HEAVEN and that has made him always to have such a BEAUTIFUL smile. RARELY has he been bad tempered or unhappy…when he is, we know that SOMETHING is wrong or he is feeling ill.

Right now, at 6 years old, this little boy has been thru things that NOBODY should ever have to go thru. This little guy has been in an ambulance, being transferred CODE 3, while being bagged and intubated due to having had a massive seizure lasting sometimes over 2 hours, over 10 times in his little life. He has been taken by AIR AMBULANCE (helicopter) 2 times due to the same as above!!!! He gets pounded on by a CPT vest machine for 2 times a day everyday while getting a nebulizer treatment due to his chronic lung disease. And if he is also ill because of respiratory infection (which he gets sick often), then he might have to get the treatment every 2 to 4 hours thru out the day, be on oxygen and then get suctioned sometimes down his nose to TRY to help him get all the crude out of his lungs. And while I am doing this, I am having to HOLD HIM DOWN, because he is kicking and crying thru it all and just making your heart hurt because you KNOW it is just so MUCH for this little boy. But after it is all said and done, he will sit up and smile. Our son….he is just such an AMAZING little boy with sooo much strength and such a SPIRIT. And THANK YOU GOD, he is so STUBBORN! It is a blessing…he sleeps with an oxygen monitor on him every night and we are always listening for alarms to go off.

But beyond his illness, he is learning so MUCH. He is g-tube fed but he can eat, and when he WANTS to orally eat, boy, he can go to TOWN! We LOVE watching him eat food and munch and ASK for food. He may only eat as much as a 6 month old, but every spoonful and bite is just such a BLESSING. Some days he surprises us by eating FOUR chicken nuggets!!! Yep, that is our boy. And talking, well, that is definitely still a struggle for him. He has low tone and apraxia which causes him to have a very difficult time with his speech (and eating too). But he is working hard on it. He does have a communication device that he is using more and more to communicate with us. He amazes his teacher & therapist every time. We are so proud of him! He also knows so many SIGNS. Unfortunately, because of his low tone and lack of coordination, he has a harder time MAKING the signs. But he tries so hard and when WE make the signs, he knows what we are saying. In school, he is doing AMAZING and is progressing along very well. He is cognitively there and is so SMART! He loves to mess with the teachers and play with them. He loves to make them laugh!

And walking, well he is on his way. He can crawl up the stairs on his own. He can walk up & down the stairs if we hold one hand and he holds the banister with the other. Slow and steady he gets there. He can pull himself to stand on almost any surface. He learned how to pull himself up from the floor to stand using a kitchen COUNTER. And WHAT was he reaching for when he got up there and WHY did he want to do that?! Well, because my IPHONE was sitting on the counter and he wanted it! And he got it too! We have to be careful now because he will watch us from the living room to see where we set it down and if we are not careful, well, he will be making TONS of phone calls! Several of James buddies know that if they get called and no one response to the hello, that it is probably Matthew and they start to talk to him!! Awwww….in therapy, he has learned to use a walker without ANY SUPPORTS or STRAPS on him…just him and a walker in front of him walking all over the place there!!! Just amazing! He is progressing well with that area and we just need to keep pushing him. As long as he wears his AFO’s on his feet he does well. Just progressing nicely in this area. I hope he DOES learn to walk because he is getting HEAVY. He is solid!

Our son Matthew…what a JOY and how PROUD we are of him. He brings a smile to our faces with just a look. He LOVES his brothers and they love him. And daddy, well, you can just IMAGINE the love he has for him!!! It is ALL about DADA! That is ok. Not many people are as BLESSED as we are with Matthew….to have such a SPECIAL child in their lives, IS a BLESSING. I look back some days at when he was born and remember thinking, wondering, knowing that his FIFTH day, he would leave this earth and our arms…and PLEASE don’t think that we gave UP on him, because that did not happen. What we did was we GAVE HIM UP TO GOD and we told God that whatever HE decided, we would understand and LOVE HIM…but we were PRAYING soooooooo hard that THAT was not GOD’s plans for him. And PRAYING so hard that he be HEALED and asking others for those prayers. We could NEVER imagine that we would be parents to a special needs child. But we always knew that God had BLESSED us with Matthew and that Thru God, we know that He will always help Matthew and help US in all that there is to do. There is no fear or any sadness in our hearts for ANYTHING having to do with Matthew. To us, he is a normal child and we treat him as such. Of course he has limitations and we work around everything, but we LOVE to go traveling and go places and everywhere WE go HE goes!!

And HERE WE ARE…our beautiful MIRACLE MATTHEW ISAIAH has turned 6 YEARS OLD. Every DAY, hour, minute, second of his life has been precious and a blessing to us. We couldn’t imagine a day without our Matthew with us and PRAY we never have to! We know that we were VERY BLESSED that God left him with us. We KNOW THIS. That is why we are ALWAYS THANKFUL TO GOD!!

So, that I have probably caused those that didn’t need glasses to need some, I will finish with a couple of montages that I made. The first one is a picture montage of our MAKE A WISH TRIP (I know a YEAR late!!) and the 2nd one is all about Matthew!! And you will see that the first part is probably familiar because it IS! We NEVER want to forget what a miracle he is….but the 2nd part is more updated pictures of him up 6 years old. We hope you enjoy it!!



MAKE A WISH MONTAGE:




MATTHEW ISAIAH IS 6 MONTAGE!:)


THANK YOU ALL for all the thoughts and prayers for this little boy thru out the years....we have been so BLESSED to have ya'll in our lives. GOD BLESS!!



love,

The Gonzalez family