Good afternoon dear friends, introducing another awesome angel miracle. I think you guys will enjoy this one. From now on everytime the story is real long I will use a larger font size, so it will be faster to read. Lots of love, light and hugs. &, Uma      For Love Of Logan    Tami Carroll grew up in a small Indiana town, married in 1986 shortly after her high school graduation, and had her first baby, ]aclyn, a few years later. "It was a routine pregnancy and delivery, no trouble at all," Tami recalls. She and husband Todd settled into a peaceful life on their farm, e~oying parenthood and planning a lar1;Cr family. There was no warning of what was to come. Tami became pregnant again in 1993. Everything seemed normal until her sixth month, when an ultrasound revealed problems. Tami's obstetrician, Dr. Diana Okon, gently broke the news. "The baby had chromosomal abnormalities, stemming from a condition that is always fatal," Dr. Okon says. The child, a girl, would die either during the next few months, or shortly after birth.   Tami and Todd were heartbroken. They named their unborn daughter Megan, and hoped she knew how much they loved her. Eventually Tami gave birth, but there was little to celebrate, for baby Megan was stillborn. "My mother had died when I was twenty," Tami said, "and at the time I thought there could be no greater pain than losing a parent. But now I had to admit that the pain of losing a child was even worse." Also difficult was the seed of doubt that had been planted. Could this happen again-did the Carrolls have some kind of genetic defect? Worse, what if Megan was the last child they would ever conceive? Tests on Tami and Todd showed nothing amiss, however, and eventually Tami became pregnant again. But now she was nervous, afraid to get her hopes up. In addition, although Tami had grown up as a Southern Baptist, she hadn't been to church in years. "For many reasons, I had sort of given up on God," she admits. "At times, I felt that even if He was listening to me, He probably didn't care." But gradually, as this pregnancy progressed, Tami found herself talking to her Heavenly Father. "God, please give me a healthy baby," she asked each day, Megan's death still fresh in her mind. Even if she and God had not been close for a while, He surely wouldn't ask her to go through another loss like that, would He? Time passed, and despite her worry, Tami had no problems. Dr. Okon monitored her carefully, doing a chromosomal test as well as ex- tra ultrasounds. The baby-a boy whom the Carrolls had already named Logan-looked vital and completely normal. Tami was due on April 9, 1995. But when she went to the office for her scheduled checkup on April 5, Dr. Okon decided to hospitalize her early the next morning. "I think she knew I was worried, and it might be better for me to be induced in a controlled setting," Tami explains. The following morning, Todd and Tami drove to Clark Memorial Hospital in nearby Jeffersonville. Tami was admitted, labor began, and everything seemed fine. Baby Logan was closely monitored, and his heart was healthy and strong. Todd and Ruthie, Tami's sister, were with her, and as things progressed, the grandparents assembled in the waiting room. It would be a joyous event, not like the last time, they all assured each other. New life was budding. Logan was almost here! By late afternoon, Dr. Okon had delivered two other babies, and was as ready as Tami to meet little Logan. Her contractions strong and healthy, Tami was taken to the delivery room. She was almost to the end now, and as the nurses cheered her on, she pushed and pushed. "One more!" a nurse shouted. "He's almost here!" Tami pushed again. But Logan's heart rate had suddenly slowed. And at 4:42, as Dr. Okon took him from the womb, there was no heartbeat at all. "There was a loose umbilical cord around the infant's neck that slid off easily .... [His] mouth and nose were bulb-suctioned on the perineum and the fluid was clear," Dr. Okon wrote in a later report. But the baby's Apgar score-the test that detennines newborn health-was zero. He wasn't breathing. "Call code," Dr. Okon quickly told a nurse as she carried the lifeless infant to the warmer on the other side of the room, and gave him oxygen. "Come on, Logan!" she murmured. "Wake up ... " Another nurse started chest compressions. There was no cry, no heartbeat or pulse. The baby's eyes remained closed, his limbs limp, his color an unhealthy gray. "Logan?" Tami asked. "Todd, why isn't he crying?" Todd stood in shock, watching nurses running here and there. No one was saying anything, and the silence was horrible. Logan, Logan, please cry .... Ruthie realized something terrible was happening, and hurriedly left the room. Within seconds, it seemed, an emergency room physician raced in, followed by Tami's pediatrician, who had been summoned from her nearby office. One of the nurses phoned Kosair/Children's Hospital in nearby Louisville, Kentucky, which has a neonatal unit and specialists on call. A respiratory therapist passed Tami, then an X-ray technician. "What is going on?" Tami screamed, beginning to sob. Tears streamed down Todd's cheeks. A nurse tried to comfort them. "We don't know anything yet," she whispered. It couldn't be happening, not again. She couldn't lose another child .... Logan, please breathe. Dr. Okon came to Tami's side, to finish the delivery process. The specialists, she explained softly, had intubated the baby and were forcing air into his lungs. Someone had injected medication, someone else was taking X rays, everything possible was being done .... To Tami, it was all a horrible nightmare. She had thought everything was under control, and now she realized that nothing was. Only God could help Logan now. "Dear God," she whispered through her tears, "please don't do this. I don't think I can handle it. Please save Logan, please." Medical personnel continued to work over the baby. "But Logan never showed any signs of life, nor did he respond to any of the advanced cardiac life support efforts by the code team," says Dr. Okon. At 5:15, thirty-five minutes after delivery, the neonatal specialists from Kosair and Clarke Hospital personnel agreed to discontinue all resuscitation efforts. Logan was pronounced dead. Unobtrusively, a nurse baptized Logan. Another weighed himeight pounds, three ounces-cleaned him, wrapped him in warm blankets, put a little stocking cap on his dark head, and laid him in Tami's arms for a last good-bye. She held him close, searching his perfect little face. "Logan, don't go-I need you," she whispered. But her son's eyes were closed, his body completely limp. Dear God, please ... She had to let go, to accept the inevitable, but somehow, she couldn't stop praying.   Dr. Okon and the pediatrician stood by Tami's bed; the others had left the delivery room. "We don't know what happened, Tami," Dr. Okon said. "We won't have any answers unless we do an autopsy." Tami blinked back tears. Perhaps an autopsy would save another family the suffering she was enduring. "All right," she agreed. "But I want to hold him for a while." "Of course." Someone brought a consent form, and still holding Logan, Tami reached over and signed it. Dr. Okon left the room to break the news to the Carroll relatives in the waiting room; soon they streamed in, murmuring words of encouragement, mingling their tears with Tami's and Todd's. Todd cuddled Logan, then passed him to Ruthie. The nurse took some photographs. Occasionally the baby's body moved slightly, and the first time it happened, the nurse went out to the front desk and alerted Dr. Okon, who was talking to her partner on the phone. Dr. Okon explained that such a phenomenon was called "agonal breathing," and was just a spasm or a reaction to the medication the baby had received. How unfortunate, she thought, that the Carrolls had seen it-it was almost like Logan dying twice. At 5:55 P.M., mourning was coming to an end, at least for the moment. It was time, everyone knew, to turn Logan's body over to the hospital. Tami's stepmother was holding him, and she bent over him to say a last good-bye. Once again, his little body went into a spasm.   Tami's stepmother looked, and looked again. "Tami, he-he's gasping!" she cried. "Look, his leg moved!" "It's just a spasm, like the nurse said," Tami answered. I don't think so-I think he's breathing," Grandma exclaimed. "Ruthie, get a nurse!" Ruthie did. In an attempt to calm the family, the same nurse came quickly and put her fingertips on the baby's chest. Then she reached for a stethoscope and listened. "Wait right here!" she shouted, as she ran out of the room. Dr. Okon was still filling out forms when the excited nurse approached her. "She said, 'The Carroll baby has a heartbeat,' and I responded, 'The next one to have a heart attack is going to be me if this doesn't stop,' " Dr. Okon reports. But when she reached the now silent room and approached Tami's stepmother, she could see that the baby was turning pink. "He's alive?" she asked the older woman. Tami's stepmother could only nod, her arms trembling. Astonished, Dr. Okon took the baby from her. His little chest was rising and falling rapidly. "He is alive!" she cried. "Let's take him to the nursery!" Nurse and physician ran with the infant out of the room. Tami began to weep. She had been grieving for over an hour for her child, and now, it seemed, the cycle had started over. "Don't do this again-I can't lose him twice!" she wept, as Todd, still thunderstruck, tried to comfort her. We don't know what's going on, Tami," he explained. Tami did. It was just a cruel joke. For some reason Logan's little body was still reacting to treatment, and everyone thought ... But such things were impossible! Her son had been dead for an hour and eighteen minutes-no one could come back to life after all that time. And yet, she had asked God for a miracle, hadn't she? Medical personnel began reappearing in the delivery room with bulletins for Tami and Todd. The neonatologists from Kosair/Children's Hospital had returned, dumbfounded. They were currently examining Logan in the nursery. His disbelieving pediatrician was also there, along with doctors from all over the hospital, responding to the quickly spreading news. Despite the impossibility of it, Logan was breathing on his own, and appeared healthy. He had been placed in an oxygen tent, and tests were proceeding. Of course, there were undertones that were not mentioned, at least not at this joyful, exultant moment. A baby clinically dead for over an hour would no doubt have severe brain damage, as well as nonfunctioning optic nerves, tissue damage, seizures-the list could be endless. But for now, everyone was in a state of awe. It was, as Dr. Okon described it later, like seeing the shadow of God passing by. Baby Logan was transferred to Kosair/Children's Hospital and remained there for five weeks. He slept for the first two, due to medication reducing the possibility of seizures, then gradually began to awaken. Although brain-damaged babies often don't suck, he nursed immediately. Tests showed that his eyes and hearing were completely normal. Today he is progressing a bit more slowly than the average baby, but his neurologist is "cautiously optimistic" that Logan's future is bright. What happened to this very special baby? No one really knows. So far, there has been no medical explanation, only theories suggesting that Logan may have eXperienced the same kind of situation as a drowning victim-when systems shut down for a time, then spontaneously revive. However, Logan had never actually been alive after birth, and Dr. Okon, who has seen nothing like it in her years of practice, is grateful that she was not the only specialist on the scene. "If I had been alone," she told Tami, "I might have concluded that I had made a mistake, missed a tiny sign of life. But there were other physicians there, including neonatologists, and we all agreed." Logan was dead, and then he was resurrected. The "how" is hard enough to answer, the "why" almost impossible. "While Logan was hospitalized, I saw other babies who were very sick," says Tami. "I remember thinking, My Logan? W hy not these others?" Tami knows this answer will remain a mystery. But her baby's story has touched many-and perhaps that is a reason in itself. Medical personnel at Clarke Hospital have dubbed him "Lazarus." Strangers approach Tami on the street with tears in their eyes. Even an elderly lady wrote to tell the Carrolls that the same thing had happened to her at birth, and no one had ever believed her mother-until now. "Maybe God wanted to show us that miracles do happen, to say, 'I'm still here and I still raise people from the dead,' "Tami says. "And maybe it's not my job to ask why, but just to keep telling others, and keep saying thank you." She and Todd are very willing to carry out that heavenly assignment. What else can one do with such a wonder?