One month young today!

 Evangeline is 1 month old today! It's hard to believe that this little bundle came into the world- this crazy city of Bangkok 4 weeks ago! Oh how time goes by fast... This month she has had so much fun because her Mimi came ALL the way from Florida to be with her for 3 weeks. Mimi and Evangeline have had quite the adventures! They have gone to the mall, the American Embassy to get her passport, the Thai markets, rode in tuk tuk taxis, had dinner outings with our Thai neighbors, and even went to a Rabbit cafe (yup with actual real bunny rabbits). Evangeline has been so blessed by having her Mimi here and having so many visitors love on her. She has had friends from Nepal, Japan, Thailand, and America come to hangout. 

Evangeline came two weeks early so we had to reschedule our baby shower and she got to be there too. She is like her mommy, she doesn't want to miss out on anything!

Her mommy and daddy have been so deeply blessed already by her presence in their life. Words do not do justice to describe the immense love and honor they feel to be her parents. They can not wait to see how her little life will grow and impact the world. May Evangeline Nora truly live into her name and see the greatest honor in this life is to be a message bearer of the gospel.

Our Birth Story: 

My water broke at 1:30 AM on February 9th, however I wasn't sure if it actually broke because it was a small amount of fluid. Throughout the night I was having contractions but they're just small ones at this point.  The next day Josh and I got up because we had a training with our ministry, Dton Naam. We woke up at 8 AM, got dressed, got on our motorcycle and rode it to the Bangkok Train System to get to DN. During the training I was in a little bit of pain, the contractions were feeling a bit stronger, but I just sat through it.  I was sitting there trying to focus but all I could think of was, I feel like this could be the real thing. After the training ended I went downstairs where our social justice cafe is located. You wouldn't believe it, it just so happened that there was a group of Bangkok midwives meeting in our cafe (no coincidence right). When the midwives finished their conversations amongst each other, I thought I would ask one of them for their opinion about whether or not my water had broke. I told them, "I think it broke in the middle of the night, but I am not positive." One of the midwives named Haley, who was is total stranger was willing to check me in the restroom to see if indeed my water broke. After she checked she said, "yes it definitely seems to be your amniotic fluid." Haley said, "you better call your doctor and go see her right away to get her opinion." At this point Josh had just left the cafe to go to language school so I called him to come back and meet me so that we both can go to the doctors together. He agreed to meet me at the hospital. After I got off the phone with Josh I grabbed a motorcycle taxi and jumped on the back of it with my little Thai taxi driver. Moto taxi's are the quickest way to get through traffic. As we were weaving in and out of the Bangkok traffic I was thinking and laughing to myself, "I could be having this baby today and here I am riding on the moto, this is crazy!" Anyhow, I made it safely to the doctors and Josh got there a few minutes after me. We walked up to my doctors office, she checked me out and confirmed that my water broke and that I will be having the baby tonight or tomorrow. At this point, I was only 2cm dilated and I wanted to labor at home as long as possible. My doctor agreed and suggested that we go home and try to stimulate the labor process. She told me, "come back to the hospital when your contractions are so intense that you can't talk." Josh and I jumped into a taxi and headed home, it was about 3pm. 

Side note: One of the cool things about my birth story is that I always thought if my mom wasn't able to be here in time for the labor then I would really want my friend Pam Attaway to come and help me because she's a nurse and a sweet friend of mine who also works with The Mission Society in the Northeastern part of Thailand. So after we got done with my doctor we called Pam to ask her a few questions about labor. However, to our surprise Pam was actually in Bangkok that day!!! Pam agreed to come help us throughout the labor if we wanted her help. She told us to call her back if we needed anything.

Anyways, Josh and I got home at 3 o'clock and we began to stimulate the labor process, I got on a birthing ball and I took a warm shower. We also tried resting just a little bit because we knew this would be our last time to get a good sleep. I fell asleep for just a few minutes in between contractions and at one point the baby moved really hard and a huge gush of water came out. I knew that labor was really in full swing now. We continued to labor through the contractions and Josh was a huge help to me. I would lean on him and hug his neck while I was going through the contractions. He would help me focus and breathe. About 8 o'clock at night the contractions were getting really really strong and like my doctor said, "come to the hospital when its so strong that you can't talk." Welp... I was definitely not wanting to talk at all, I was in the zone and focused, but I did I tell Josh I think it's time now that we go now. He began packing up the rest of the things we needed for the hospital and then we both decided we would ask our next door neighbor Pii Pat if we could use his car to drive to the hospital. Pii Pat is our closest neighbor and has always said, "if you ever need to use my car, it's yours." Pii Pat is also the Muay Thai instuctor who has a mini training gym in his patio, so every night the neighbor kids and their parents come to hangout and train... Well, when Josh went over to ask him to borrow his car, in his state of anxiety he mumbled in Thai, "BABY COMING NOW!" All of our Thai neighbors of course were interested in seeing the "farang" (which means foreigner) in labor. At this point 5 people follow Josh into our house to see all of the hustle and bustle. There was a grandmother, a seven-year-old girl, teenage guy and girl and Pii Pat. It felt like the whole neighborhood popped their heads in to see how I was doing. The grandmother was giving Josh advice, she was telling him, "hurry you need to take an ambulance because traffic will be bad, stop packing your bags and just go!" Poor Josh, he was so overwhelmed, he was speaking to the grandmother in Thai, packing our bags, AND helping me through my contractions that were every 2-1/2 minutes apart. He was great, what a champ for handling all the people and pressure. Me on the other hand, I was so focused and my contractions were too strong to even talk to people. But I do remember looking up and seeing the little Thai seven year old girl peeking through the crack in my door. I somehow mustered up a smile to her and she grinned back. Finally we got all of our things and jumped into Pii Pat's car. Both of us were a little concerned because traffic in Bangkok is nuts! It was 8pm and a true miracle happened... there was no traffic at all which is so unheard of at this time of night! Anyhow, we zipped down the street and made it to the hospital in 20 minutes, by 8:30pm I was checked in. They checked me and I was only 4 cm dilated, the roads were really bumpy and I think it caused my labor to slow down and I was a little bummed out, but Pam joined us at the hospital and she encouraged me to move around as much as I could. I decided to get on the birthing ball and rock my hips back and forth and then I would hug on Josh's neck during the contractions and Pam would rub my lower back. I stayed on the birthing ball for about an hour and then I started feeling like I wanted to push, so Pam went and got a nurse and within that one hour on the birthing ball I went from 4 cm to 9 cm. The nurse called my doctor in and she checked me and saw that my cervix was slightly swollen so she pushed on it to create more space for the babies head and it worked I was finally at 10 cm and my doctor said, "OK you can push now!" Strong contractions came on and I took two deep breaths and began pushing. I could feel the babies head crowning but I didn't have the enough energy to push her all the way through- it was really difficult, but I remember saying "I can do this, I can do this." Pam put a cold cloth on my forehead and Josh continued to encourage me to take deep breathes and push. At one point I whispered, "Jesus help me" and Josh and Pam thought that I said to them please help me and I told them, "no Jesus help me." I kinda laughed inside and then we all began praying and the next contraction I took three deep breathes and pushed. I could feel the baby's head moving forward and I saw that her head was out and then I pushed again and her whole body came out, it was beautiful. They placed the baby on my belly and Josh got to cut the cord. Since the baby was in my womb for such a long time since my water had broke, they needed to check her to make sure she was healthy. She didn't cry very much and they were concerned that amniotic fluid was in her lungs. I was with her just for a few minutes and then they had to take her away but Josh stayed with her the whole time. I was just in awe of what happened, it all went by so fast! I was only at the hospital for about 2 hours before Evangeline came and I pushed for a total of 45 minutes. I was on cloud 9, I was so happy to be with my baby girl and her sweet daddy! Our hearts were full of praise! God really did answer all of our prayers, I wanted to try having her all natural and I wanted her to be healthy, there was no traffic, and our sweet friend Pam was there to help... the whole 9 yards! It was amazing!   

We stayed at the hospital for 2 days and had so many sweet visitors. Evangeline was surrounded by the nations- we had friends that were Thai, Japanese, Nepalese, and Americans came to love on her! One of the students that we have been working with in the cafe came to see her and he said the most precious thing. He said, "Josh and Bekah, I know when you first moved to Thailand you were not expecting to have a baby soon, but I know that God has a plan for you guys. Evangeline is a gift to us!" This brought tears to my eyes because we have given Evangeline a Thai nickname called "Kong-kwang" which means gift. We have been praying over her that she will be a gift and source of light to the Thai people. When our student said this, our hearts rejoiced to feel the confirmation from God through him. Our hearts are full!