Save Your Freaks

This is a skill that I learned when I was rushed to the hospital at 32 weeks pregnant, unsure of whether or not my baby would be born prematurely, scared to death that he would be in the hospital forever and have complications. I knew that things could go from bad to worse in a matter of hours…or minutes…and I also knew that once the tears started, it was not likely that I’d get them to stop.

So here was my theory…if I freaked out right from the beginning, something really bad might happen, and I wouldn’t have any ‘freak tokens’ left. I would already be over the edge, and have nowhere to escalate to. I told myself that if I stayed calm, then I would have plenty of ‘reserve’ freaking that I could do later if necessary.

What happened is that I was calm, cool, and collected. Okay, reasonably so. I felt the Spirit with me each day, and I was able to handle things fairly well. I liked knowing that I had reserved the right to freak … later.

I tried to teach this to my nieces, CJ and Allie last summer. Having a house full of boys, the drama is somewhat limited. Not so with two tweenish girls!  Everything is a big deal, and I know that for Bro and Sis, it’s bound to get worse. I was a teenage girl once. I know how it works.

One of them was upset about something, and started to stomp off and pout. I laughed and called her back, explaining the ‘save your freaks’ option of life. They thought that I was a funny, but I hope that in some way, I caught their attention.

Teens would do well to follow my advice, since everything is a tragedy. Problem is, after your parents (or friends, or boyfriends, or teachers…) have dealt with so many freaks, they lose interest. It’s like the boy who cried wolf. They no longer see your crisis as a crisis. It’s just another dramatic episode. Saving those really big freaks for a later date gives you that leverage to get their attention.

For me, it means keeping my emotions in check. I’m not bottling anything. I deal with the emotions in a much less stressful way. I force myself to think things out and decide if it’s really worth a nervous breakdown, or if I can save that for another day.

So far, no straight jacket, so I’m thinking that it must be working!

Losing a Child

My thoughts keep turning back to the Borovec twins, the headstone that we found at the graveyard cleanup project, and discussed in "When Pigs Fly". My sweet cousin found their death records, and we discovered that they died of “gastroenteritis”, a digestive issue of some sort.

How sad to think that they were unable to help them; this is something that with today’s technology and knowledge, they could certainly manage in any hospital. In 1917, it was another story. I know from my readings about the Flu Epidemic that doctors were not very well trained at that time, and had very limited resources anyway. Not much was really known about the body and it’s systems, and those who knew were generally not doctors. Did you know that back then, you didn’t have to graduate from any medical school, or even prove your competence? Truly a scary time to be sick!

It is apparent that it was either environmental or contagious, as both twins were affected. Was it something that they ate that caused gastric distress? Food practices also being suspect at the time, it may be that they ate something that they simply could not deal with as tiny boys, only three years old. (The age of TODDler!) Their parents may have eaten the same thing, and not been affected at all. Or was it a bug?

I of course think of their mother, who likely cared for them and watched them go, five days apart. To lose first one, and then, still grieving that loss, to lose the second. I cannot even imagine her pain.

Being a mother is the most important thing in my life, and I am dreading the day that my children move out…I can’t stand the thought of losing them in any other way. When I found out that we would be having Todd, it was a total surprise. An unplanned pregnancy. (considered as an ‘unwanted pregnancy’ by government agencies who track this sort of thing, but I assure you that unwanted and unplanned are two entirely different things!)

At 7.5 weeks, I began to hemorrhage. This carried on for days, and my doctor had no explanation. He told me that if I was miscarrying, there was nothing that he could do to save my baby. I remember sitting in his office, sobbing to his nurse. I was already committed to and loved this child more than anything. I couldn’t imagine losing him, even though he was something that we had not planned for.

Thankfully, it turned out to be a case of Placenta Previa, easily overcome and everything was fine. When he was delivered at 33.5 weeks, we worried again about losing him, but were spared any further concern, as he was healthy and hearty.

Being in NICU made you realize how very blessed you were. Babies all around us were struggling, having heart issues, breathing issues, and there was always the threat of losing one of them. I saw a note on the cart that they use to take baby photos with, indicating that if the staff was taking ‘bereavement photos’, to be sure to get the parent’s permission, signed. It reminded me that not all of the babies that I saw each day would go home. Even with today’s medicine, we still lose babies. Life is fragile.

My cousin lost a little baby, born too soon. He was so early that there was really nothing that they could do to help him. In years past, they called it a miscarriage, and treated it as such. At 17 weeks gestation, however, he was fully formed and beautiful. They were fortunate to have delivered in a hospital that allowed them to hold him, to love him, and to celebrate his very, very short life. They buried him in a ceremony sponsored by the hospital, and he has a tiny grave and everything. He lived. He deserves to be remembered. My cousin still misses him, even though she knows that she will see him again. She keeps his memory alive with her remaining children, and looks forward to the day that she will hold him forever.

It really doesn’t matter at what point you lose your child…you just shouldn’t have to deal with that.

I had an ancestor that delivered some 15 children, and only about 5 of them lived beyond the age of 10. Times were much harder, and accidents were frequent with the type of lives that they lead. To bury one child would devastate me. I suppose you would have to become somewhat hardened against the loss, having buried 10.

When Tux was a little boy, I had to take him to the oral surgeon to have some teeth removed. They allowed me to hold him as they gave him the sedative, as he was highly agitated. Whatever they gave him began to work almost immediately, as his little eyes glazed over and began to twitch a bit. Then he just relaxed in my arms and closed his eyes.

I burst into tears.

Not only was this hard for me to see, but a young boy in our ward had recently died, and I know his mother well. She had stayed with his body until they came to remove the organs that he would be donating, then held him as they took him off of life support and let him return home to his Heavenly Father.

All of this came back to me as I held Tux, knowing that in a short period of time, he would awaken and I would have him to hold. This Sister had to hold her son, knowing that he was leaving her. Through my tears, I tried to explain this to the surgeon, who was rethinking the wisdom of allowing a mother to see her child sedated.

We just don’t know how lucky we are, to have healthy children. It’s something to remind ourselves of every day, so that we don’t take our time with them for granted. Tonight, I am giving my boys an extra hug and kiss. Maybe two, one for each of the Borovec twins.

My Darkest Day

Boy, that sounds ominous, doesn’t it? I had to reconsider the title before deciding that it would work…not because the day that I am going to discuss is not Dark, but that I’m always hesitant to define the best or the worst. What if I remember a darker day later? So the day that I’m going to tell you about is the Darkest Day that I remember as of this minute…and hopefully the Darkest Day that I’ll ever have! I can’t even think of being more miserable.

It was three years ago today. I had given birth the day before to a beautiful, albeit tiny Baby boy. He was perfect! At 33.5 weeks gestation, he weighed only 4 lb 5 oz, but was healthy and didn’t even look like a preemie. He was our miracle…an oops that we could never have imagined in our most wonderful dreams. The pregnancy was more difficult than my other two, but he was wanted and loved as much as they had been. They had been perfectly planned; he was a glorious surprise. As one would expect, he was taken from my arms to NICU in minutes after his birth. He was on a ventilator for only about 30 minutes, and that only because he had ingested blood and needed to clear his lungs and throat.

The dark day began at midnight, when all of the other mommies in post-partum were waking to feed their newborns. Midnight is a key time, as the nurses come in to weigh the babies for the start of the day, and there is crying all down the hall for a good hour or so. Beautiful wailing of sweet little ones, who are so new to the earth that they are still scared and agitated when taken from their mother. My baby was one floor above me, and I was unable to be with him. I’d never experienced this before. My other two were able to spend most of their day in my room, and I had full access to them. Since I’d had a cesarean, I couldn’t move well, and was confined to my bed. I had visited him many times that first day, when my family would take me in a wheelchair to sit next to his isolette. But all night, I heard the full term babies cry as they were checked out, then slip into silence as they snuggled up to sleep.

Because he had been born so early, I felt as if I was suddenly and inexplicably alone. I had been in bed for 12 days prior, every minute being aware of his movements and listening to his heartbeat on monitors. Now, it was quiet…no baby heartbeat, no movement, just an empty space where he used to be.

I was being cheated of more than a full month of feeling my baby move inside me. My body was completely out of whack, having terminated the pregnancy much earlier than it had expected, and I think it was about that time that the hormones began to fly off of the charts.

I was very tired, as I had not slept much the night before his birth, either. My blood pressure had been abnormally low – which I felt was a blessing! As a mother of “advanced maternal age”, I had worried that my blood pressure would be high, so when they were worried about it being low, I couldn’t see why it was a problem! My doctor came in first thing that morning and did some tests, then seriously talked with me about the blood pressure issue. She said that if my hematocrits did not come up considerably, that they would need to give me a blood transfusion. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to her, as it was now daylight and I was ready to see my baby. My health seemed to be a minor concern, compared to what he was having to endure, and I simply did not want to waste any time talking about it. Because I had such low blood pressure, they would not remove my catheter or IV, and I had to be moved in a wheelchair.

On top of all of this, I hadn’t really paid attention to or asked about my pain meds, and somehow, they slipped through the cracks. Okay, I was a little flighty when it came to those things; I simply wanted to get up to NICU. So I went most of that day without any pain meds after having major surgery the day before. I was in intense pain, and it wears you down.

I finally arrived in NICU to see my baby. He had slept well, and would be able to eat today. What great news! As a breastfeeding mother, I knew that would give us time to bond and be together. I’d never had a preemie before. I had no idea how different they are from a full-term baby. I didn’t realize that he was not strong enough to suck, much less to breastfeed, which takes much more energy. ‘Eating’ for him meant a gavage tube down his nose, through which they fed him the precious few drops that I was able to express that first night.

The nurse that was in charge of him that morning was not particularly forthcoming, and didn’t explain much about what was happening. I sat in my wheelchair, all day, watching him sleep. I could touch him, although the nurse didn’t seem to like that, and I certainly couldn’t take him out and hold him. The nurse appeared to be very put out that I wanted to hold him, and put me off as long as possible. And he did NOT want me to breastfeed! I felt so alienated and didn’t get to connect with the baby at all! Even when I held him, I felt like the nurse was agitated that I was doing it, and it made me more crazy.

I returned to my room that night and was inconsolable. I cried harder than I can ever remember crying. You have no idea the emotions that you will feel when your child is in NICU…pain, loneliness, and sorrow that your child is not with you…panic that something will go wrong, especially when you are not in the NICU with him…isolation, because the world keeps spinning and all you can think about is your baby, wanting to be with him even if it means spending hours just staring at him…anger that this has happened, that you are not able to take him home…frustration that you don’t understand what is happening with him, and that the world of preemies is so intimidating and confusing…loss in the sense that you have had weeks of pregnancy taken from you, and that your dream of having a healthy baby to love has been dashed…and GUILT…because it was MY body that did this to him.

I was so frustrated with my role as his parent, because I had not even had the chance to hold him and love him that day. I wondered if he would come home to a family that he didn’t know, a mother that he didn’t recognize. I had no idea how to parent him!

My hubby tried desperately to get me to sleep, to get my pain meds worked out, and to take care of myself. He knew that if I was in better condition, I would be able to help my baby more effectively, but I was hopeless.

By early the following morning, I had cried a million tears. As the night progressed, I went from despondent, to angry, to furious. By the time morning came, I was a new woman. My meds had stabilized, and I was able to get up and walk around. I went down the hall to fill my own icewater, something that I’d been unable to do for the last two weeks. That was really liberating!!! And thankfully, my blood pressure had come up and I was able to shed the unwanted baggage that I’d had to drag around.

I marched into NICU that morning with determination. A wonderful, caring, and amazing nurse was in charge of him, a great change from the medically competent but emotionally distant nurse from the day before. I stood my ground, and let her know how difficult that day had been for me. How I felt like I was being shuffled off, away from the baby. That the nurse hadn’t explained anything, and that I wanted to be with my baby and care for my baby as much as I could.

She simply smiled, and began to fill me in on the intricacies of premature babies. I learned so much from her over the three weeks that he remained in the hospital! They are an entirely different breed from full term babies! She explained to me why things were being done, how much I could be involved, and how important it was for me to be there for him. I felt empowered! I was able to change his diaper, take his temperature, and assist in any things that the nurses were doing with him.

I still cried. Between hormones and emotions running rampant, I cried until the day he was allowed to come home. But at least I felt that I was able to DO something; my baby was not completely out of my care.

Our time in NICU was the longest three weeks EVER. But, in hindsight, it is something that I will treasure forever. I truly believe that the closest thing to heaven on earth is NICU. These tiny frail bodies are almost always inhabited by the most vibrant spirits! (If they are not valiant spirits, they do not make it that far) To be in their presence is an honor. And the staff…I cannot say enough about NICU staff. They are angels. Besides the terrible day that we had, which was just one nurse that was not empathetic. These nurses and doctors not only care for the fragile babies in their care, but they treat the entire family, as we work through the process. They took care of our physical needs, our emotional needs. They talked me through the hard times, they comforted me when I thought that my baby would never go home. Most of all, they provided excellent, loving care for my baby. I will forever be in awe of the staff that blessed us.

Three years later – the baby had a birthday on Monday! – He is healthy and wild and crazy and strong, and you would never know that he was once a scrawny little preemie. The three weeks in NICU seems like a flash in the pan. I’ve not since had a day nearly so dark…but I learned a great deal that day. I learned that you have to stand up for yourself. You have to voice your concerns, and ASK for help. Ask in prayer, and ask those around you. You need to be an active participant in everything that you do.

I also learned that post-surgery pain meds are a must, sleep is a very good thing, and once in awhile, my hubby is right. {wink}