Saturday, June 22, 2013
Elijah had chest tubes put in. He was given morphine for the pain.
I called the nurse to find out how he'd been doing. At one point she said "He's okay now but your son stopped breathing for a minute..."
My heart caught in my throat.
I could hear his heart rate monitor beeping loudly in my ears even though I wasn't near him. I could feel myself wanting to vomit as I clung tightly to the phone.
Desperately wanting her to tell me everything was going to be okay.
She didn't tell me how things would be, but he was stable.
And I was terrified.
I started to fear the worst. Like the possibility he really could die from all this. Everything started to unravel.
There was something said about stopping the morphine since that seemed to be the cause of it all. But he was still in pain. They'd given him something else.
My baby. Laying in the NICU two floors away. In extreme pain. And I couldn't go see him or hold him right away.
Later I talked to my mom. She told me she was on her way back up here after she'd heard he'd taken a turn for the worse. A little over 24 hours later and my brother surprised me with a visit as well. My dad stuck around for several days because he was so depressed over all that was happening.
The support of family was incredible. And yet...
Every day that Elijah got better, I fell apart a bit more.
Still in shock. Unable to process it all. Trying to protect myself and my sweet baby boy. Watching him fight for his life, or seemingly. I remember one of the doctors saying he was totally fine, just needed help with getting started. I thought he'd fallen and hit his head.
My baby was not totally fine! I couldn't take that as real.
Until he was at home with us, he was not okay.
I will never forget the moment I learned my son stopped breathing. And the real work began of learning to trust. That was the big moment of 2013 for me.
What was yours? Please share! I would love to hear from you!
1 comment:
Oh, goodness, Roe. Sounds so frightening. Even with all we went through, we had a lot of heads up... no surprises about what would happen, except initially finding out the news that something was wrong at 13 weeks gestation. I can't imagine you going through that. It had to be so awful to be so far from him. I can imagine the prayers you prayed in desperation... sort of how I prayed loudly when Anysia's head dropped and she was ready to come out, but her heart rate dropped dangerously low. "Oh, God, please let me meet her!" was my prayer. I didn't care who in the room heard it. And he did let me meet her. And I fully trusted Him when I prayed it, as I know you did in your ordeal. Even if things had not turned out the way we wanted, we trusted. It's not easy. But the alternative is even more difficult. You ask what our big moment of 2013 was. Well, there were many. When she was born, of course. But the day we found out something potentially life-threatening and fatal was wrong. That was the real biggie. Funny, because I was getting ready to write about it, too. It was truly the very worst day of my life. I can hardly write even just a few words about it without getting so emotional. Yet, God was good to us that day, and protected us... calmed the biggest storm we had ever found ourselves in. I'm so glad that He calmed yours, too, and that it was a good outcome. Hugs to you today.
Post a Comment