March 30, 2006

When the doctors said “no,” God said “yes”

By Alesha Ferguson

Sasha Naomi Ferguson, was born June 3, 2001. My husband, Robert, had just finished the spring semester at Southwestern Assemblies of God University. Robert and I have long felt God’s call and know that someday we will be in the former Soviet Union preaching and teaching as missionaries. Every choice we make, every action we take, has been focused on preparing our lives to answer God’s call.

Both of our children came to us as very special gifts from God. Our first child, Nadya, was a miracle baby. Doctors repeatedly told us that I could not have children. After seven years of marriage, I carried a baby for eight months, a child the doctors said would never be conceived. When Nadya was 22 months old our family grew again. Sasha joined our family. We had asked for one child and God gave us two. When the doctors had said “no,” God said “yes.”

Almost immediately after Sasha was born we knew something was not quite right. She had extreme difficulty nursing. She and I spent two unsuccessful hours with the lactation nurse. The nurse then decided to have me give Sasha a bottle. Our concern began to grow when she could not get the bottle in her mouth either. Finally the nurse had me use a syringe to get nourishment into her. We literally dripped the fluid down into her throat and prayed that it would stay down.

Three very long weeks passed before Sasha could nurse properly, and reflux was still a constant problem. After six weeks it was time for me to go back to work. In August, I was working, Robert was attempting to attend graduate school, and we were trying to care for two small children. Sasha cried constantly. The semester came to an end and we made a choice.

Rob left his graduate program to return to pastoring without completing his masters degree. This way I could stay home with the girls. Sasha was ill constantly. Her asthma was much worse than her sister’s. She snored, and if she stopped snoring I panicked. It meant she had probably stopped breathing again.

We kept telling the doctor that Sasha did not make any sounds other than crying and she did not respond to her name. It seemed that she was locked in her own little world. Sasha was almost 2 and still not talking when the doctor decided to send her to a specialist for speech testing. This led to several trips to Arkansas Children’s Hospital and finally surgery. Tubes were placed in her ears and her adenoids were removed. Sasha came home a new child.

She could hear, she quickly began to produce sounds, her balance improved, and she began to respond to her name. The snoring decreased and the sleep apnea episodes ended. For the first time in two years I could sleep without fear, without waking to wonder if my baby was still breathing.

Sasha’s ability to create sounds increased for a while, then her development stopped. Her physical skills stopped advancing as well at a point far below her age group’s developmental markers. At 3 she returned to Children’s Hospital for a new speech evaluation. That was when we first heard the term apraxia.

We learned that apraxia is a motor skills disability that can affect a child’s speech and fine motor skills. With intense speech therapy, physical therapy and occupational therapy a child can slowly improve in all areas. Developmental delay is expected to always be an issue.

The physical, emotional, and financial strain on our family was enormous. We consulted our presbyter and, with much prayer and many tears, resigned from our church. We began attending church in a nearby town, working and taking Sasha to therapy. Our church family joined us in constant prayer for both of our girls as they struggled with health issues.

Driving on my way to work I prayed, “God, are You telling us that we are to wait until Sasha is grown to fulfill the call You placed on our lives so many years ago? I cannot take a child with special needs and an inability to speak her own native tongue to a foreign land. If You want us to go overseas while Sasha is still a child, we need a miracle.”

The next Sunday our pastor felt God’s guidance to bring the girls to the front of the church for special prayer. We learned later that during the middle of Sunday worship at my mother’s village church in Alaska she felt compelled to stop the service and lead the congregation in prayer for Sasha. (My mother is Dasie Daugherty, an Assemblies of God U.S. missionary in Alaska.)

In the weeks following that Sunday we watched a miracle unfold. The little girl who struggled to be understood by family members was suddenly talking to everyone. She began running, playing and functioning very close to an age-appropriate level. Each day she seemed to gain new words, and her sentence structure passed the norm for her age group.

Two weeks after that Sunday service as I drove to work, I prayed again. “God, what is going on? The doctors said Sasha would never talk freely. Yet this morning my little girl told me, ‘Have a good day at school, Mommy. I love you.’ ” I did not hear a voice, I did not see a vision, but deep in my heart I heard an impatient answer that brought me to tears.

Well, you asked for a miracle.

When we pray for a miracle, why should we be surprised to receive it? This was a reminder to me that when the doctors say “no,” God can still say “yes.”

Alesha Ferguson is a licensed Assemblies of God minister and attends First Assembly of God in Forest City, Ark. (Bill Cooper, pastor).