Friday, June 19, 2015

June scrapbook day, a Monday

On June 15, 2015, a Monday, we enjoyed a play with our friends mentioned in the previous post before heading to Miss M's sports class. It was just another Monday. We had some laid back family time over the weekend. The kids enjoyed riding a little train at the local mall, playing soccer and badminton, and biking together as a family. Sadly the k man came down with a virus going around the youchien and has missed three days of school this week due to a cough and fever. Hoping he makes a full recovery before a busy weekend with friends tomorrow. Enjoy the recent pics of the kids lately.


Tuesday, June 9, 2015

Fun with friends

It was two years ago on a hot August morning that I met a lady at the park. We were the only ones at the park braving the heat and I offered her daughter some bubbles to play with. Little did I know she spoke fabulous English having lived abroad at different phases of her life. She has become one of my closest friends here in Tokyo and now lives a five minute walk away from us. We see each other twice a week on average and our kids get along marvelously (she has a little girl who is same age as the K man). Yesterday we enjoyed a play at our favorite local tire park and ice cream afterwards. The K man conquered the zip line finally and Miss Fumie conquered the slide forced by the kids making her go with them. 


J man is 3 months

It is hard to believe the J man is 3 months old already. He is gaining weight and growing nicely. He is starting to coo and smile more and more. He is such an easy baby. I sometimes forget he is around. I still cannot tell who he looks like, but he does not seem to resemble the other kids when they were babies. He is simply his own little person. He is about 16 pounds (7 kg or so) and is just so sweet, I cannot say it enough. 

To document his three month mark, I thought I would post the email daddy sent to his American family after J man's birth. This is his version of our story. I do not share it lightly, but it is part of our story, and since I use this as a scrapbook at the end of the year, I wanted it documented. I've wanted to document it for a long time but simply wasn't ready. It's not easy reading these words from your husband and envisioning what he was going through at the time. But now I am ready and I want it recorded as part of our family's story. And the pictures below, in addition to the j man, are of a beautiful sunset God gave me tonight. I am not sure how much longer we will live in this apartment but I do love this view and this city. I thought it fitting to put these pictures after the words from my husband, because in spite of all we endured through the birth of Jun, we know a God who is bigger than difficult circumstances, creator of this entire world, and we trust that everything we experience in this life is filtered through His hands. 

Hey all, I think most of you all knows  by now but in case you have not heard, Shari suffered greatly during the labor.  During the labor, Jun's heartbeat went down significantly.  The most likely caused was the umbilical code wrapping around his neck, so the doc induce labor with medication and Jun was born at noon.  After few check-up, I realized Jun is okay and thought all is to look forward to the happy time but that was not the case.  Shari continued to bled after the birth but the Doc thought this was normal and left the seen and the midwife was looking after Shari.  Meanwhile, I went to different floor with Jun as he had to be monitored for a while and we were concerned for him.  One hour later, I was asked to come back to the labor room by a panicked midwife, she didn't tell me anything other than something is not quite right with Shari.  By the time I came back to the labor room, I saw several midwife running frantically, looking for doctors, really, they were looking for any doctors they could find but they didn't have luck finding anyone when i saw, meanwhile, i was not allowed in the room but could hear Shari screaming in Japanese and English both stating she is in pain and keep making a comment  "i see a lot of blood, fix me, i do not want to die, i am in pain".  All midwife can say to her was "it's okay" in Japanese.  Seriously...  It felt forever but perhaps 5 min or so, one doctor came down and said, "I will fix you, your uterus is bleeding".... well, thanks.. she comes by and tells me, "your wife is having hemorrhage and i will need to focus on stopping this bleeding in the operating room, so i may not be able to talk to you as you may wish"  "i tell her you do what you got to do, i will sit tight..." as she goes back to wheel shari off to the operating room, i hear her asking the nurse, "have you not got hold of Dr. Sakamoto yet? "  that's the main obgyn who helped us birth Jun.  it's probably a good thing in the sense that shari could not understand all of Japanese.  this was around 13:00 and next two hours, i was waiting at the end of the hall way, and all i saw was this tiny Japanese lady with lunch bag screening "move out of my way" going back and force between surgery room and it appear to be medication storage room.  i probably saw her 5 times periodically doing this.  i do see different people go in and out of operating room but there are few operating room in the area so i am not all sure what's going on.  around 15:00, i saw our main obgyn along with the lady doctor who was there first tells me with very serious face, which he typically has some what of american sense of humor as he was educated in the U.S., tells me 'your wife is suffering from extensive blood loss, it has no longer has an ability to stop the bleed on its own... in fact, she is not breathing on her own right now without a tube and a machine.  we must perform hysterectomy otherwise we will lose her, even performing hysterectomy, i cannot guarantee but i know the result if we don't do this..."  i am not quite grown up enough to hear things like this about my wife but all i can say is doc, you go do what you got to do, i will sit here and wait.'  being honest, i was not sad, was not mad, just shocked, don't know what else to do but to sit.  thankfully, old wise nag nagged me that i need to receive a care from pastor and the church must pray for us.  the pastor showed up within 30 min and he and i have prayed, cried, and sat together for a while.  around 17:00, the doc came out of the operating room and gives me a thumb up from the distance as he chose to come out of the another door, which was much further down from where i was.. why didn't he just use the door that was nearby where i was.. people.. really.... he tells pastor and i that "the surgery went well and the bleeding is stopped... she has lost 5000cc blood and she is receiving with transfusion. she is still under but will wake her up slowly as we monitor her, there are still number of things could go wrong with transfusion and other aspect of the surgery but i believe the worse is behind us, just sit tight.. "   there was new dad who i saw earlier that, his wife had a while to go for the labor, so they were both walking back and force in the hallway, came over to the vending machine to buy him a drink where pastor and i was sitting got scared as he saw two grown man hugging and crying uncontrollably.  but you get the picture.  it was around 20:00 when they wheeled shari out of operating room and moved her to ICU.  we visited for few hours but she was mostly out of it, wasn't sure what happened or wanted to know.  
Well, the healing has started physically and emotionally.  physical damage appear to be healing as well as it can be, although we are little worry about blood clot as she starts on blood thinner as there is some concerns.  Otherwise, she is out of ICU and started to eat solid food, walking some etc.  emotionally, it may take longer than physical perhaps.  she has lots of alone time in the morning as i am not allowed to visit (i fought but japanese stick to the rule for better or worse) in the morning.  saten certainly love the opportunity.. 

meanwhile, fun thing is coming out of this... shari and i have been grace city church tokyo, which is one of church plant movement by redeemer in new york.  this church is great and growing so fast but very young.  shari has been instrumental for leading woman's ministry, gathering woman for the prayer, gathering volunteers to take meals to mom who just had baby etc.well, there has been amazing amount of support is pouring from our church right now.  there are so many people lined up to provide meal, child care, and even financial assistance to address extra burden (child care / medical etc).  and there has been a leader who's taking a leadership role beside Shari to support those who are in needs.  humbling.. to say the least.  we feel like the body of the church is coming together for the first time, perhaps it was always there but at least we feel like we have not seen this pouring of support.






 


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Monday, June 1, 2015

Tokyo Disney Fun, in the Rain

Friday we went to Tokyo Disneyland. It was Miss M's graduation from kindergarten ceremony, even though we still have 9 days left of school! We went a bit earlier simply because it was a good day for daddy to take off. The forecast called for occasional showers, but we thought we would take our chances. We got there around 10 and immediately got our fast pass for Pooh's Honey pot ride. Then the K Man wanted rides and more rides, and Miss M wanted to watch the parades. We divided and conquered! The rain was periodic throughout the day with some fairly strong showers at certain points, but we had our rain gear and enjoyed the cooler weather and shorter lines as opposed to hot sunny conditions and long lines. At around 5 it stopped and we thought we were in the clear. I took Miss M to the night time electrical parade and daddy took the K Man to drive cars and ride the rollercoaster in Toon Town. While driving, the rain picked up, but it did not stop the K Man. He just kept wanting to ride it over and over again. Unfortunately their rain gear was with us in the stroller. When we went to meet them to leave the park, they were soaked. The K Man put on his Mickey poncho and said, "Ok, now that we are in our rain gear can we go again?" So daddy, being the ever kind and patient daddy that he is, took him one last time. I think he drove the cars about ten times and rode the roller coaster about 6 times. It was a fabulous day in spite of the weather and we all had a lot of fun. Even the J Man, tagged along. I told the husband "He is such a good baby that I often forget he is around." He just went a long with the rest of us and never once got fussy or unhappy. Of course, how could he when he is at the happiest place on earth?!:)