We Have A Son!

September 13th, 2010

I have a son! My wife, Witni, gave birth to our son at 2:13pm on September 8, 2010. The total delivery time from when her water broke at 5am on September 7th to when he was born was 33 hours. 33 hours of labor! My wife is a superwoman. And not only did she go through 33 hours of labor, but she delivered vaginally. Unbelievable. I was right there coaching her the whole way, and it must have been the hardest night of our life, but we were rewarded with our little boy! Emil Regan Sztanyo was 6 lbs and 13 oz when he was born. Emil (pronounced like Emmit) is after his great grandfather, a WWII veteran, Christian patriarch and humble man. He is almost 89 years old, and he played a round of golf with my brother last week. Regan means born into a royal family, which we believe he is born into THE Royal Family, those adopted by our Father.

Emil & Mom Seconds After Birth

What a joy and a blessing this little baby is to us. We had been praying for him to come for a long, long time. A few years ago, we were called out of a high school ministry, Young Life, and knew God was telling us to start this business and have a family. A year and a half after trying, we were pregnant with little Emil. And now, we know we are completely blessed by his arrival. God gave us this blessing, and helped us through the delivery. In fact, in those final hours of the night, as my wife was suffering through the pain and exhaustion, we prayed like we had never prayed before. We prayed for this baby to come, for the pain to cease, for the desire to push (we never got to 10 cms), for mercy and for deliverance. He heard or prayers. There were so many scriptures going through our minds, but none more prevalent than this one:

¹ Unless the LORD builds the house,
its builders labor in vain.
Unless the LORD watches over the city,
the watchmen stand guard in vain.² In vain you rise early
and stay up late,
toiling for food to eat—
for he grants sleep to those he loves.

³ Sons are a heritage from the LORD,
children a reward from him.

⁴ Like arrows in the hands of a warrior
are sons born in one’s youth.

⁵ Blessed is the man
whose quiver is full of them.
They will not be put to shame
when they contend with their enemies in the gate.

Psalms 127

The sex of our baby was a surprise to us, and when he finally did come, they asked me if I wanted to announced what he was. I was so overwhelmed with relief that it was over for Witni that I had completely forgotten we didn’t know what it was! So, I looked down at our baby, as he was laying on Witni’s chest, and emotionally blurted out, “it’s a boy!”. What a blessing!

I have so much to write that I think I could write a book. Emil is 4 days old today, and he is doing better each day. We are breast feeding, and after some help from a lactation expert at the hospital, little Emil has acquired the “taste”. He is eating better and better each day. He was a bit jaundiced, and we had to take him in for tests the past few days, but he didn’t have to go on the “billy” blanket. He got a little sun today, which I think he rather enjoyed. He has so many people who love him already that he doesn’t know how good he has it.

Ok, enough for now, I’ll be sure to write much more later. If you want to watch a bit more of the delivery (PG rated), here’s a video.