The NICU Roller-coaster

I was discharged from the hospital 2 days after Layla was born, on Christmas Eve. I will never forget how it felt to be pushed out the door with my "It's a Girl!" balloon and Diaper Genie from the hospital and leaving my little girl behind. I held it together all the way home but as we were getting out of the car, I spotted the diaper bag. My husband had brought it to the hospital when I was in labor. He quickly grabbed it and helped me inside but it was too late. Walking in my front door, with just her diaper bag, was more than I could take. I just crumpled to the ground and sobbed. My husband held me and rubbed my back but I don't think he knew what to say. It just felt so wrong. I never thought I would come home without her. It almost felt like she wasn't real. Like the whole thing had been a dream.

Once I was able to get up and calm enough to think, I sprung into action. I had 2 hours until I was due back at the hospital to feed her. I had just enough time to shower (it felt like heaven) and force down an english muffin, before I made what would be the first of so many trips to the NICU. The whole time she was there, I only missed a handful of her feedings. We were working on breastfeeding so the hospital let me stay in the Ronald McDonald room a few nights and I got up every 2 hours, scrubbed in, sweated bullets while I tried to get her to eat enough, walk back to my room and pump, lay down, repeat. I never slept really. I never ate. I lost all my baby weight in 2 weeks. My entire life revolved around the NICU. Around her body temperature (she couldn't keep it up) her wight (she dropped down to 3lb 13) and getting her to eat enough so they wouldn't put the tube back down her nose.

All of the nurses seemed to love Layla. They were amazed at how "aware" she seemed all the time. She would lay there in her isolet, watching everyone that went by, patiently waiting for me to take her out and feed her. She was so skinny and small, we used to say she looked like a plucked chicken, and thats what I called her. My chicken. She seemed to be wise and thoughtful, with her big dark eyes. Always taking everything in.

The entire experience is a blur, and something I am just glad to have survived. I couldn't have done it without my husband. He was there almost as much as I was and always managed to keep things positive. After struggling to kick her jaundice and a few set backs, Layla finally got to come home on January 5, 2011. She weighed 4lb 5oz and was bright eyed and so alert as we climbed the stairs to our apartment. As I walked through the door, holding tightly to the car-seat, all was finally right in the world. The sleepless nights and dirty diapers ahead didn't matter. We were finally a family.

The Main Event

My pregnancy was pretty uneventful, for the most part. I gained weight slowly and exercised through my second trimester. I ate fairly well, despite my indulgences in cheeseburgers, chili, and tacos and I was feeling healthy. At 29 weeks, I went in for my regular prenatal appointment and my blood pressure was high. It was somewhere around 140/100. My OB sent me to the hospital to be monitored. It was scary, but my blood pressure came down within a few hours and I was released. By the following week I was starting to feel pretty ill. My blood pressure would spike and I would see spots and feel light headed and then it would quickly drop down and I would be nauseous and tired. My doctors rarely caught my blood pressure at its peak and sometimes made me feel like I was over-reacting or trying to get attention. I fought and finally ended up with bi-weekly non stress tests.

At 34 weeks, an ultrasound during an NST showed that I had sever preeclampsia. Even though my protein levels always came back borderline. I was immediately induced. They estimated my daughter's size to be 4lb 10oz. Small but not dangerously so. Still, I was feeling so scared and guilty. I had failed my daughter and now she was being evicted before she was ready. It all happened really quickly but what I remember from that night, is lying in the hospital bed feeling her kick and singing to her, trying to fall asleep. It was hard to get y head around the idea that I would be holding her the next day. I wasn't ready to let her go. I wasn't ready to make her face the cold world. But she wasn't safe inside either. And neither was I.

Less than 24 hours after my ultrasound, and with only 4 pushes, I delivered my beautiful little Layla.She was 4lb 1oz and 18 in long. It was the first time I ever saw my husband cry. She had lots of  long dark hair and long skinny fingers. She looked just like my husband. She was perfect. The cord was around her throat twice, but no one told me until days later. She needed a little air but started screaming almost right away. I was so relieved. They let me hold her for about a minute before whisking her away. I wasn't allowed to see or hold her for the next 24 hours. Being seperated from her, so soon after finally meeting her, was a pain I will never forget. I felt like I was dying from the magnesium they had me on for my blood pressure and I couldn't get out of bed. My little girl was down the hall in the NICU and I couldn't go see her. I thought she would forget me.

I was counting down the minutes until I could go to her and slept with a picture of her the NICU nurses sent down to me. When I was finally wheeled into her room, and I saw her lying there with the IV and all hooked up to the machines I felt like something in me broke. I just sat there and cried and talked to her and held her tiny little hand. I was so grateful to have her safely here in the world with me, but at the same time I was so afraid of all the uncertainty ahead.

The Beginning

I felt like a mother long before my daughter was even conceived. Growing up, all I wanted in life was to be a mother and a wife. Perhaps I was born a few decades too late. I would always smile and tell my teachers that I wanted to be a nurse, or a teacher, or an author when inside I knew that my life would not be complete until I got to hold my own little bundle of joy and create a life devoted to them and their happiness.

By the time I was 25, I was still unmarried and without children. I could literally hear my biological clock ticking in the background of my life. Although I wasn't even 30, I felt like time was running out. I was with my boyfriend for 5 years and was desperately waiting for him to propose. I am very traditional in certain ways, and I really wanted to be married before I started a family. I took my birth control day, right on time, knowing that if I did get pregnant it could be dangerous due to a heart medication I was taking. So when those two pink lines showed up on an HPT in my apartment bathroom, shock was the overwhelming emotion I felt. My boyfriend and I had not much money in the bank and was just going back to school to finally finish my BA. I was scared and not as excited as I always thought I would be. I cried. I was afraid to tell my boyfriend because I thought he would blame me.

I will never forget the look on his face when I broke the news, several hours and 2 more HPTs later. His eyes were filled with joy and excitement, with just a touch of panic. No blame. No anger. Just the look of a man about to become a father for the first time. We hugged and kissed and laughed and cried. We worried and planned and began to dream about our little surprise nugget. By the time I went for my first ultrasound, I was completely smitten with my little one. When I first heard that swish swish swish of the heartbeat, I knew my heart would never beat the same again.