ONE YEAR LATER
Life after NICU...
Whether your NICU journey was one day or one year your story is valid and worth being told.
The NICU is a hard place and one coming out of that will never be the same.
The smell.... the sounds... they don't leave.
I found a cup at a thrift store that resembled a cup our NICU used for coffee.
It messed me up.
On a separate occasion my husband commented innocently:
"Brings you back doesn't it Nora!"
I was dipping my finger in leftover peach syrup for her to taste.
In that moment, I was reminded of my newborn, laying alone, all wired up forced to fast for any emergency procedures that would inevitably take place...
her hunger cries only to be consoled with sugar water...
I clung to my 10 month old and wept.
Each person's story is different and how they heal is their own journey.
All we can do is be there.
We NICU mama's now know how to comfort those who can't be comforted by acknowledging there is nothing to be done but being still and there.
The people who have been here for me in my healing journey simply listened.
After an experience like that... to be thrown back into life as if nothing happened quite frankly is unbearable. Having that one person in my corner to sit and be was life giving.
The reality of a NICU mama in her journey to heal... it's a lonely one.
Out of all my community one stayed with me through it all.
I don't think something like this ever truely heals.... just gets a little more manageable as time goes on...
It's okay to be angry, frustrated and sad.
A lot of people let us NICU mamas down.
A lot of us feel let down by our own bodies.
We see people coming home with their perfect birth and recovery story and can be overwhelmed with grief that ours is not that beautiful.
It's okay.
We are not any worse of a person for feeling our feelings and trying the best one possibly can to move on.
For there is joy again.
In all the little victories. All the little memories.
Joy will come again.
My child may have had a rough start but she is beautiful and worth the life we so desperately fought for.
No Mama.
You're not alone.
One year later.
One year at a time.
Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash
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