Words

Tonight I need a place to write.  So for the few of you that check in on this blog I apologize in advance.  But my heart is broken and a good friend said to write everything down because someday I will look back on this and find strength.  I know that everyone has trials and I know that I am in no way alone in what I am going through right now.  But for now I am grieving, and I think that that's okay, for tonight.  People always say that when you become a mother something inside you changes.  I'm not sure if that is what has happened to me or if I'm just an emotional person to begin with.

I've wanted to be a mother ever since I was a little girl.  Stuffing pillows in my shirts pretending I was pregnant and carrying baby dolls around the house.  When we found out we were pregnant I was so scared and excited at the same time.  The past 8 months have been a roller coaster of emotions.  Excitement for our baby to come and nervousness for the changes he would bring to our lives.  I played it out in my head over and over again.  I was nervous for labor, how did a body go through all that? How was that ever going to fit?! I was so excited to just hold my baby. I would think about it all night long sometimes.  Holding him so tight and loving him as much as I wanted.  I was so excited for all my family and friends to come visit us in the hospital and to love him as much as I already did.

I was hoping he would come early, and I guess I jinxed myself, I was thinking December 29th sounded good instead of January 2nd.  But November 27th works too.  I don't think I fully understood what the future was holding for us when my water broke 1 day before being 35 weeks.  When the Neonatalogist came in and talked to us while I was waiting for an epidural I don't think I grasped exactly what she was saying.  I was more focused on breathing through the contractions, I didn't understand that she was telling me that my baby wasn't going to be "okay".  Epidurals are amazing bytheway.  But nurses running in with panicked looks in their eyes, not so amazing.

Being told that your ready to push but you have to push fast and hard is one of the craziest moments.  Really? This is happening now?  But again panicked doctor voices don't make that moment feel very good either.  The words "C-Section" was never something I ever even dreamed of.  I doubt many mothers do.  I always skipped that section in the books and articles I read.  It all happened so fast.  I just remember crying and apologizing over and over again to everyone in the room how sorry I was.  I felt like I was starting off a bad mother, I couldn't even deliver my own baby.  Jason was so calm and great through everything, I felt like I was letting him down though.  This experience that he was so excited for wasn't going to happen.  Being wheeled down the hall into the scary bright lights of the surgery room, I didn't even register what was about to happen.  I was so grateful for the big blue sheet that didn't let me see what was happening but at the same time I hated not knowing what was going on.  I just locked all my focus on Jason's eyes and watched him watch me get sliced open.

I still remember the little tiny cry at first, and then nothing, I remember yelling out "why isn't he crying?!" and then it came, not the loud crying you hear in the movies but just enough of it.  He had his own special team waiting for him.  I was trying to watch him so closely, I just wanted to see him, to count his little fingers and toes and just to know that he was okay.  I will never forget the feeling when they laid him on my chest for those short minutes.  He just looked at me with those perfect little eyes, he was so tired and honestly so was I.  They took him away and I fell asleep while the doctors continued to work on me.

They told me I wouldn't be able to be with him and that he would be in the NICU, but I don't think I grasped exactly what that meant until I was sitting in my room and realized there was no baby in my tummy but no baby in my arms or even my room.  It is such an empty feeling.

I know we are not alone in this.  So many people have shared their NICU experiences with me and it gives me comfort and strength to know that I'm not alone and that it is not forever.  But for tonight I feel like I can feel a little sorry for my self.  I know we are so blessed.  His lungs are good enough that he hasn't needed to be on oxygen and in the past four days he has dropped down to just one IV and one feeding tube.  I know it could be worse.  I know there are thousands of babies worse off.  I know we are so blessed and I am in no way complaining.

Tonight's my first night at home though.  The silver lining in having a C-section is that you get to stay in the hospital longer and I was there exactly as long as they would let me.  Getting into the car empty handed with an empty car seat in the back isn't how I planned it either.  The empty bassinet I'm looking at right now makes my heart ache even more.  You almost have to "relearn" how to walk after a C-section.  It is so painful and tiring and the only motivation I had was to walk down to the NICU, which isn't very close, but at the end is your baby so you push through the pain and just do it.  It's funny how proud of yourself you can get just over walking distance.

The Nurses say that I had to pretty much give birth twice and that it is going to take a while for my body to recover.  So while I'm home healing I'll be praying that my baby is doing the same thing.  Finish growing little Ashton your mom and dad want to cuddle you and kiss you and I never want to hear that "times up" and have the nurses take you away from us to plug you back into everything again.  Even though I think you look so cute with your little sun glasses on, I miss your eyes.  We hardly ever get to see them open so thank you for looking at us so long today before we left.  Every night since you were born I just look through all your pictures trying to remember every little feature of your face and hands and feet and every little part of you that I don't even know yet.  Please know that we didn't leave you and that we are coming back to see you tomorrow and the day after that, and the day after that, and the day after that....