I had not had anyone in our circle of trust who had a preemie or a baby with a medical need. We had no experience with the NICU at all. I will never forget July 24, 2010. At 10am, I was packing up to bring my baby home and at 12pm, I was sobbing crying on the floor of a sterile room while my daughter laid on a stainless steel table on O2 with just a diaper on. The sweetest intake nurse (I soon learned all the terms) Jennifer told me that Sloane had pneumonia to which I started crying....the bad sloppy cry. I am pretty sure my husband picked me up off the floor. It was a Saturday so it was a quiet day in the NICU. A pregnant doctor came in and said Sloane was being started on antibiotics and would be checking in for the 5 star treatment for 7 days. They needed to find out why my 4 day old baby had pneumonia. What happened next saved me. Sloane became the primary patient of a seasoned NICU nurse who became our everything. Our nurse, our therapist, our friend, our translator, our advocate, our parent at times and most of all Sloane's protector. I can not imagine what Donna was thinking of us that first day. We must have seemed like scared children who were really professional adults. She sent us home to get our belongings so we would be more comfortable. She was going to take care of Sloane. For the minute, I laid eyes on Donna I trusted her. She held my baby and my hand during almost all test and medical procedures during our time in the NICU (post: Are We There Yet). And so we went home to bring and get our belongings. I packed for 7 days little did I know for once in my life I had under-packed.
I was in shock. I am convinced of it now. I did not understand what was happening or why it was happening. And then it happened...I shutdown. I stopped talking to anyone aside from my hubby and NICU staff. I was afraid to open my mouth because I was afraid at what would happen. Would I throw-up, would I cry, would I scream? I wasn't sure. My husband made all the phone calls. When we came home to get our things, we saw one of my very closest friends and I said not one word to her. The girl who watched me grow for 9 months, the girl who cried like a baby when she held my baby, the girl who my daughter would call auntie...that girl, I walked passed like I didn't know her. I couldn't speak. We also saw my aunt and uncle. Like a child, I hid in my bedroom trying not to have to speak to them. I was devastated that my child didn't come home with me like everyone else I knew, rip roaring fucking mad because wasn't I the girl who lost her mother...couldn't this just happen normally?? and embarrassed that I had done something wrong during my pregnancy to have caused my child to be sick. My husband called my brother and he asked to speak to me. I just sobbed and sobbed and snorted and hyperventilated over and over again. After that, no one. I spoke to no one for days. I did email after 2 days....that seemed easier. When I think back now to our circle of trust and how removed they must have felt..I do feel badly. I shut them out when in fact they deserved to know what was happening since they too had waited 9 months for our child's arrival. The unexpectedness, unpreparedness of Sloane's birth defect...shocked me. The day it changed was the day they told me Sloane was getting a NG tube, and then I called my father and my dearest friend like a baby myself begging them to come. I was in shock that something was wrong with my dream come true daughter.
It did get better as time went on. I immersed myself in my new home. My hubby and I slept together there nightly for weeks. When we learned that pneumonia was the effect not the cause, I starting staying around the clock and he went back to work coming to stay with us at night. The tests began, the diagnosis came and the healing began. Our days did become normal...this new normal for 50 days. We made friends with another family whose son was in the NICU much longer than Sloane so they were very helpful to us. We joked with our nurses, we ate in the lounge, we learned the security guards names, introduced ourselves to new families, and we lived from rounds to rounds listening to the drs. talk about our child's progress. I emailed our circle of trust daily with updates and we little by little let a few people visit Sloane. Poppie came everyday to see his granddaughter. His visit became a hi-light of the day. Everyone respected our privacy but did anything they could to help us out. We had dinner delivered, gifts given to us to decorate Sloane's NICU room, we were given rides wherever we wanted, our lawn was cut, we were forced to go out for dinner, and our house was cleaned. If they couldn't be with us, they would do for us. I will never forget any of it.
The NICU is a wonderful place. It saved my child from coming home and having months of pnuemonias before getting a diagnosis. It taught me to be a more in-tune parent. It educated me in medical lingo. It gave us confidence to be the parents of a child with a medical need. The NICU is a place. The nurses who work at it saved our child, mothered our child and nurtured our child. Thank you all the powers that be for the NICU, its doctors and most importantly its nurses.
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ReplyDeleteReading this now (roughly a year later), it flows so quickly, but it felt like a lifetime... I also cannot say enough about all that our family and friends did for us during this challenging time !
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