My all time favorite and close to my heart charity will always be the March of Dimes. We had our first preemie 5 1/2 years ago when my water broke at 33 weeks, we spent a week in the hospital while i was hooked up to antibiotics via IV, while we waited for steroid shots to prepare Donovan's lungs to join us. At 34 weeks Donovan was born, 5lbs 5oz strong but small. he would spend the next three weeks in the NICU coming home a few days before Easter.
Donovan spent several days under lights in an incubator, he had Jaundice the worst out of the three babies we had, that would go through this. He spent only about a day on oxygen, and he tapered off of it pretty quickly.
His biggest challenge would be getting the strength to eat enough on schedule so that he could come home. It was a stressful time, we spend three weeks driving down to Seattle to spend time with him, waiting for him to come home. The March of Dimes helped to make sure we would be able to do this, by taking care of all of our parking fees at the hospital, food vouchers to eat while we were visiting, activity books for Kira, they had newborn baby shoots in the NICU etc. Had we passed a month in the NICU they would have assumed all medical bills on him after the 30 day mark!
However Donovan made it home before that point, and has thrived ever since!
Athena was born very shortly after Donovan in the grand scheme of things. She was born at 36 weeks, and though much bigger than Donovan 8lbs 1oz, she had a much more traumatizing birth
and she too was admitted to the NICU. Athena had a few problems when born, the first and scariest was that she couldnt' breath. She had too much fluid in her lungs, and it took what felt like an eternity for them to finally get her to breath a little. There was no cry when Athena was born. The second issue Athena had was her blood sugar. My blood sugar had been so low they had to raise it so i could go into surgery, this made Athena's blood sugar very high when she was born. She spent a couple days in the NICU being slowly medicated down off the high blood sugar (which can cause brain damage if not done correctly) so that she could finally come off of the IV's. She also had to use a CPAP machine to help get the fluid out of her lungs, so she could breath unlabored.
With Athena being our second preemie (though right on the edge she still needed help and we were thankful to have the NICU team in the opperating room with us), we felt a little more prepared. We know what to expect when it came to the NICU.
Athena luckily was only in the NICU for about a week, meaning she got to come home a few days after i did from the hospital. Still The March of Dimes covered all of our parking costs, and made sure to send some little treat bags home with the kids.
So by the time we found out about Beatrix, our biggest goal was simply not to have a baby in the NICU! It's amazingly hard as a parent to know that you may have to leave your baby in the hospital. To have the doctors discharge you, and then you can leave but your child cannot. It's also amazingly hard as a mother, to spend your whole pregnancy waiting to meet your baby, and then to get a quick glimpse at them as they take them away, because they are not strong enough to come be with you. Beatrix was an excellent pregnancy, up until those last couple of weeks everything went very smoothly.
However in the end Beatrix too would come early. Born at 36 weeks, same as Athena, she would be much smaller 5lbs 13oz. She too would be born with fluid in her lungs, however not nearly as bad as Athena. While waiting in the pre-opp room alone (Brandon had to get the kids out of school and get them situated before rushing back up to the hospital for surgery) i remember talking to Beatrix still in my belly and telling her, I would see her soon on the other side, and all she had to do was breath and cry! Please, please cry!
Beatrix did just that, as the doctor mentioned how much hair she had (hehe, we heard that with all of our kids right before they came out), i stayed as quiet as possible and waited, and she cried, long and loud, over and over again! Beatrix would also end up on the CPAP overnight, because she too had fluid in her lungs, and though she could breath, after a few breaths she would get tired from the fluid and her breathing would become labored. Beatrix was made it without being admitted to the NICU, had it been less than 8 hours they would have just brought her back to me, but she was admitted in the middle of the night, and released to my room in the morning.
Our preemies were all success stories, they made it home (even Donovan) in a reasonable amount of time. They were strong babies without set backs, and have thrived ever since. But not all preemies are the same, with Donovan in the NICU it was eye opening to see how many other preemies were in that hospital at the same time. In his first room at least 5 other babies, across from him another 4 down the hall countless more. When he got transffered to the next level of NICU downstairs there were even more preemies, 4 per room and many many rooms. It's scary watching your baby on monitors, it's hard not to pay attention to the numbers on the screens. Or to the problems going on around you. I remember at one point snuggled with Donovan in a chair for skin to skin time, he had only been allowed out from under the lights of the incubator for about a day or two, and the baby across from us just stopped breathing. everyone came running in, and got her going again, but to see that you realize how lucky you are to have a baby thats doing so well. You stop dying for that baby to show up, you spend pregnancies praying your baby will stay put. You feel shame and responsibility for it. Even now, i mention how i tried to keep her in, that we almost made it to baby day, and Brandon reminds me it doesn't matter because we are both healthy and home.
If you ever see someone, or a business collecting for the March of Dimes i would urge you to donate, even if it's just a few dollars. They do a lot of work to not only help babies, but the mothers as well. Mothers and babies still die from complications, and preemie babies are some of the most vulnerable of all of us. Hug your babies tight regardless of their age, because even my 9 year old is still my baby, and be thankful for any happy healthy children you have!
My preemies all home, happy and growing!
Comments