When you are in the NICU, you learn to really cherish the little moments with your babies because really, moments is all you get with them in there. And when my babies came home, I clung to that philosophy. I cherished the middle of the night feedings, spent hours snuggling, and once my mom went home, my house fell to ruins because I was too busy watching the babies sleep to do silly things like vacuum.
After a few weeks though, life caught up with me and I started to try to get back into the swing of things. Taking care of babies is just one part of being a Stay-At-Home-Mom, right? And somewhere in the mix, snuggling babies to sleep turned into "OMG PLEASE NAP SO I CAN FOLD THESE CLOTHES!"
And then Audrey got sick.
It wasn't anything major, in fact, I thought it was a reaction to her 6 month shots. But her high fever and subsequent rash turned out to be a case of Roseola, which, in normal babies, is usually no big deal. But my babies aren't normal babies. And the chest congestion that can come with Roseola landed Audrey, who had been oxygen-free for three weeks, back on the cannula for four days.
She's fine now, but man was that a tough, scary pill for this mama to swallow.
I have read other preemie moms make comments along the lines of "I went X amount of days without my baby, we'll spend the rest of our lives making up that lost time." I can understand that train of thought, but the fact of the matter is you're not guaranteed that time at all. Just because your babies spent three months in the NICU does not mean that you will have 3 months or 3 years or 30 years with them at home. Tomorrow is not promised to us, we all know that but I think it's easy for us to forget that.
Enjoy your loved ones today. Snuggle your babies, hug your mom, kiss your spouse, call your sister. Life is so temporary, yall. You won't regret loving someone while you're here.
We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 1 John 3:14
Poor baby Audrey!! She looks sooooo sad. :(
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