Hope Grows in Mother’s Heart and Womb

“I sensed God just saying, ‘In this moment, while you really don't know what I'm asking of you, I want you to say ‘yes,’” and I just said, "Okay, Lord.”

Jessica and Mike Ptomey were thrilled to be the parents of two boys. Now, expecting their third child was no different.

“It was exciting,” Jessica recalls. “We were ready to have another kid. They thought maybe it might be a girl, but they couldn’t get a good look.”

But with Jessica now in her second trimester, the ultrasound didn’t confirm the gender. Instead, it showed the baby’s growth was four weeks behind and Jessica’s amniotic fluid was low. Their doctor told them the baby wouldn’t survive.

Jessica remembers that conversation. "He said, ‘Whenever the heartbeat stops, you're so far along, we'll have to induce you and deliver a dead baby,’ and I don't think there's any way you can really at all prepare for that kind of news as a mom. I remember obviously being so sad, but to be quite honest, I was terrified."

Mike agrees, “That was the hardest thing for me, the idea that there was still going to be a birth, and when the baby was going to be delivered, it was going to not be alive. That was really, really, really heavy.”

Back at work, Mike managed to keep his emotions in check, but later that night...

“Everyone was asleep, and it was the first time I was by myself with the news and I just laid on the floor and just cried.”

Now, their focus shifted from getting the baby room ready, to planning a funeral. The couple shared the news with family and friends, asking them to pray for comfort and strength.

“I was like, ‘Lord, how could I possibly live through that experience?’" Jessica remembers. “I can't even honestly imagine anything more horrible, and I just knew that I was going to have to have supernatural strength to be able to get over that fear.”

Then came the task of telling their oldest son, four-year-old Tyler.

“We said, ‘You know, this baby is not growing in mommy's tummy. And it looks like he's going to die and he's going to go be with Jesus in heaven,’” Jessica explains. “And we're all going to be very sad and miss him.” And his response was, ‘Well, I'm not gonna - I'm not going to let that happen. I'm going to lock all the doors." 

Over the next few days, the couple still struggled to accept the news, especially since the baby was still alive. That is, until Jessica read an article about a woman’s miraculous healing from cancer through prayer.

“'I remember just having this sense of peace, that, ‘All right, Lord, the baby is not dead yet, and I just feel called to pray in accordance with your will. But you always ask us to ask you for things,' and I said, 'I'm just asking you for a miracle.'"

Although struggling with doubt and fear, Mike came alongside his wife, asking for a miracle. Over the next week, their community enveloped the Ptomey’s in prayer.

“It was everything to have other people pray and to join you in prayer and to see the body of Christ come together regardless of their denominational background. It was beautiful,” Mike says.

Jessica also attended a special healing prayer service with a friend: “That was a moment of spiritual healing for me, sitting there, kneeling in the pew, waiting my turn to go be prayed for. I wasn't afraid anymore.”

Then, a couple of days later, Jessica had another ultrasound; the baby’s heart was still beating. Jessica remembers how she felt. "I had such a peace that, ‘Okay Lord, whatever your will is here I'm good with it.’ but there was a lot of hope."

And that hope grew! So much in fact, that Jessica asked her friends to pray not just for peace and comfort, but that her amniotic fluid would increase and that the baby would double in size. 

Then, two weeks after getting the bad news, Jessica went in for another ultrasound.

She recalls the doctor’s words that day. “He was like, ‘This is really weird; the baby has actually doubled in size,’ and then I knew exactly what he was about to say next, ‘and the amniotic fluid has increased.’  The doctor said, 'I don't um, I don't have any explanation for you.' I said, ‘We don't need an explanation. We've had a lot of people praying for us.’ and he said, "Whoever's praying for you, can they please pray for me too?'"

“I love the expression on the nurse’s and doctor's face compared to when it was the bad news, ‘cause they're still perplexed,” Mike adds. “It's funny. All of a sudden, the story has changed. It was unbelievable.”  

There was one brief scare when Jessica got an infection at 6 months, but again, with prayer, she and the baby pulled through.

Then on June 26, Samuel Gerard Ptomey was born at full term, a little small at five pounds, nine ounces, but perfectly healthy. 

“I don't think I even have words to express the emotion that I felt of seeing that baby that I had prayed for,” says Jessica. “He was so tiny. And just so precious, perfect and beautiful!”

Mike agrees. “To see him, it was transformational, and it was wonderful. It was the best!”

By his one-month check-up, Samuel had gained three pounds! 

A few years later, Mike and Jessica went on to have little girl, Stella.

Today, Sam is a healthy, happy little boy, but Mike and Jessica say that’s not the only miracle God performed.

“The biggest miracle that happened was the miracle that God did inside of my heart before he healed my baby, and that he made me okay with whatever it was that was going to happen.”

“It's beautiful that God allowed us to have this child and gifted us with this,” Mike adds. “But the real transformation is knowing that we have a good God who loves us. The only thing that really matters is our relationship with him.”