Post-Traumatic

trau·ma [trou-muh, traw-]
noun, plural trau·mas, trau·ma·ta [-muh-tuh]
1. Pathology
a. a body wound or shock produced by sudden physical injury, as from violence or accident.
b. the condition produced by this; traumatism.
2. Psychiatry.
a. an experience that produces psychological injury or pain.
b. the psychological injury so caused.

The first time my doctor mentioned it to me, I scoffed. "PTSD?" I asked, "isn't that what happens to soldiers? To people who have been through shootings or bombings or plane crashes? Surely, a little time in the NICU doesn't qualify me for that."

"Jessica," she leveled with me, "your babies almost died. If that's not traumatic, I don't know what is."

Hm.

I've always been emotional, passionate, maybe even a little high-strung. I've struggled with anxiety in my past. But the feelings I had about the babies birth and the months that followed - the worry, the worst-case scenario thoughts, the sleeplessness and anger and weight gain - I thought it was normal. Anyone in my position would feel the same, right?

For almost a year, I assumed that insert next step would make it better. Once they were off the ventilators, not so sick, out of the isolettes, on their way home. After we ditched the oxygen, stopped their meds, gained some weight, got through the scary winter, came off quarantine. Certianly, once this or that happened, I would feel better. Right? Except not. Because there we were, inching towards the babies' first birthday, and if anything I was feeling worse than the day they were born. I was constantly holding my breath, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

And with those four words - "your babies almost died" - my doctor validated all my feelings. Because she was right, so very very right. I had watched their heartbeats space out on monitors, seen their lips turn gray and felt their bodies go limp. Infections and setbacks and alarms dinging, things that haunt most mother's nightmares - that was my reality. And like it or not, it changed me.

So I started seeing a therapist, and I started taking Prozac. Are drugs right for everyone? No. But they were right for me. I'm not afraid any more. The nightmares have stopped, I can fall asleep easily, I can leave the house without melting down first. I don't feel guilty taking an hour for myself to go workout or have dinner with friends. I am living, really living, and enjoying my babies. Getting help through the medicine and the therapy does not make me less of a person, or less of a mother. In fact, it's just the opposite - I am a better overall for it. It has been over 6 months now, and while I hope I don't have to do this forever I know if I do, that's ok too.

So there you have it, friends. That's what has kept me from my little corner of the internet. I have been wanting to "come clean", but I was nervous. It was hard to put it into words. And don't get me wrong, our little life has been amazing, but I felt almost like a phony typing up these happy, chipper posts without telling you the truth behind them.

And now you know. This little flower needs sunshine AND rain to flourish :)

Well hey, Blogger.

It's been awhile, huh?

In fact, it looks like I skipped the whole month of February. Oops! I didn't do that on purpose.

The thing is (and this is me being real and honest here), I've been having a really hard time with this time of year. It was this time last year that I was big and pregnant. We had found out on the first of February that we were expecting a boy and a girl. We were planning the nursery, picking names, buying things in pink and blue. The babies were just beginning to be really active and Chris was just beginning to be able to feel them from the outside.

One of the last belly pictures, taken March 5 2011 (almost a year ago exactly!)

I was one of those insufferable women who really LOVED being pregnant. I felt amazing, I carried it well, my hair was awesome. My pregnancy was perfect until it wasn't. And now, looking back on that time in my life is so bittersweet. I was so blissfully unaware of everything that was going to go wrong. I'm glad I have those wonderful memories, but I also still mourn the trimester I never got. I have moments where I am jaded and bitter and angry. I'm not proud of them, but they are a part of me and a part of this whole preemie-mom experience.

And all I can do is keep moving forward from it.

They make it all worth it :)

This Love That Surpasses Knowledge

http://tipsontriplets.wordpress.com/

A friend of mine posted this link on Facebook today, asking prayers for this family. They lost their triplets at 22 weeks.

22 weeks.

I was put into the hospital at 22 weeks. I was in labor at 22 weeks. Their story could so easily have been my story.

Reading this has brought up so many, many emotions, some I've worked through once already and some I've been ignoring and some I didn't even know I had. That story - it mirrors mine in so many ways. Praying for extra days, just one more day, just get us to that point. Scary statistics and questions that no parents-to-be should never be asked to answer. Begging the doctors for shots and pills and the magic silver bullet that would just fix it and save my babies. Those were some of the darkest, scariest days of my life and I can recall those emotions so vividly and reading those words - my words, but on someone else's story - has brought those emotions raging back.

And it has shown me, again, how profoundly blessed I am.

I beat those odds. I was able to make those few more days and now I have my babies. We have had a long and hard NICU stay but I have my babies. Babies that are not only alive but that are healthy and growing and thriving and are, eventually, coming home with me.

My journey has been hard but it could have been so much harder. My story could have had their ending. I skirted the edge of that pain, I felt the suggestion of what it could have been, and to have to feel the full brunt of that is something that I cannot even comprehend. My heart aches for that family. If you can spare a prayer tonight, send one up for them and their sweet angel babies.

I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge — that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. -Ephesians 3:16-19

Mama Said

I'm having a day.

Don't worry, everything is ok with the babies.

And really, I'm fine too. We've been incredibly blessed these last 10 weeks with a relitively smooth NICU stay. (Sidenote: how has it been 10 weeks already?!?) It's just that sometimes? It can be totally overwhelming. And exhausting, in every sense of the word. And very "omg if I have to walk down this hall and be buzzed in through these doors one more time in my life I'm going to scream". Right now is one of those times for me.

You're not supposed to know things about the other babies, but in a bay-style NICU it's hard not to. And this week, I overheard that the baby next to Audrey has NEC. I'm not going to tell you about NEC - not because I don't want to but because as a preemie mom it is probably my second biggest fear - and typing out the gory details that a NEC diagnosis can include would probably be the proverbial straw for this camel. A transport team came yesterday and packed that little baby up and shuttled him to a bigger hospital that is better equipped to deal with his diagnosis. That poor little guy has been weighing on my heart.

Then Audrey had to get a blood transfusion today. There's nothing even wrong with that, she's started making her own red blood cells but she's not quite making them fast enough. She's a little tired and the extra blood will probably give her a boost. But they had to start and IV to do the transfusion. And we got all our IVs out weeks ago, and it was such a "one more step forward" kind of thing, and now we're back to the needles. And watching your baby get stuck is never ever a fun thing. On top of that, we missed our once-a-day breastfeeding because of it, which was a major major bummer for me.

So now, I'm going to go eat a cupcake. And maybe skip my 3AM pumping so that I can get some good sleep. And I'm sure I'll feel better in the morning!

Woah-oh, living on a prayer

Today the babies are 55 days old.

This is significant because if they come home on their due date (which is the canned answer in the NICU, most babies do) then we are halfway there.

It's a bittersweet day though. Grayson had to be put back on the ventilator this morning. It's frustrating, but not out of the ordinary in any way... in fact, his doctor told us that "if he had come off and stayed off the first time, it would have been very abnormal." He had some fluid in his lungs and the carbon dioxide level in his blood was elevated. He was just working so hard to breathe and he was wearing himself out. It's not that he's doing bad, it's just that he's not supposed to have to be doing it at all. He's not supposed to be on the outside, he's not supposed to have to breathe on his own, he's supposed to still be a fetus.

It's frustrating and it feels like a punch in the gut, but I am still so very very proud of him. He's doing the best he can, and he's really doing so well. They assured me that it will just be a few days, a week tops, to let him rest and then we'll give it another go. He'll get it eventually. I have so much faith in him.

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. -Galatians 6:9

Why?

I have a lot to write about.

Like how going back to work wasn't so bad. And about the March of Dimes walk I did this morning that was wonderful and so fufilling. And I need to make a big ol' update about the babies and how AWESOME they are doing.

But today... today, a new baby was admitted into our NICU. Not an uncommon occurance, but this baby is different. This is the first baby I've seen where the nurses have whispered "probably won't make it".

It shatters my heart.

I see this mom, still in a hospital gown and hooked to an IV, and she looks terrified and I want to hug her and tell her it's ok but the fact of the matter is it's not ok. This woman is living out my greatest fear right in front of my eyes, the fear that I danced dangerously close to and somehow escaped, it is her reality now and it absolutely shatters my heart.

I've asked God why a LOT throughout the last eight weeks. Why me? Why us? Why my precious, tiny babies? Why did this happen to me, and not my sister-in-law, or my three (yes, three) best friends who are also pregnant, or the woman in line behind me in Target? Why didn't He stop it from happening, make me go to the doctor earlier, slow my contractions? Why?

Tonight though, I'm asking a different kind of why. Why have my babies done so well? Why do I get to keep them and other women don't? That baby is no younger or smaller than what my babies were (because let's face it, my babies were as young and as small as they could be and still be considered "viable"), they were born at the same hospital with the same medical team and the same care, so what makes them different?

I know that I will probably never know the "becasue" to my "why". I just know that my babies are special, they were chosen for this and this is the path that my family was given to walk and there's no turning back now. And I know that I am incredibly lucky.

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart." -Jeremiah 1:5

An Ode to Pumping

Who has two boobs and an infection in both??? This girl.

At first I thought it was a plugged duct. Then maybe it was mastitis. The Lactation Consultant said maybe a yeast infection. My OB cultured my milk, and it came back positive for an infection called klebsiella.

Ugh ugh ugh. Let me tell you all the reasons why this sucks so bad. First of all, it makes it really painful to pump. Pumping is about a negative 32 on the 1-10 scale of fun to begin with, so adding pain in the mix makes it EVEN WORSE.

(For those of you not in the know, pumping is an alternative to breastfeeding, except instead of a cute cuddly baby doing the eating, you hook yourself up to a machine that expresses the milk for you and stores it in bottles. The thing with pumping though, is you have to do it on the same schedule as a newborn would feed to establish your milk supply. Read: 20 minutes, every two to three hours. All day. All night. And I can GARUNTEE that waking up at 3am to plastic parts is not near as fun as waking up at 3am to that cute cuddly newborn. Buuuut they tell me that breastmilk is absolutely the best thing I can give my babies, so I pump my brains out anyways.)

(Wait, can it be considered an "Ode to Pumping" if I'm talking about how much I hate it?)

Reason numero dos the infection sucks: I have to dump all the milk I make until I finish up my antibiotics. I still have to do all the work, because otherwise my supply will tank and I won't make as much milk, but all my efforts are down the drain. Literally. And we're currently in the process of testing all the milk I have in the freezer to see when exactly the infection set in. We're all the way back to APRIL THE FOURTH and it is STILL COMING UP POSITIVE OMG. Everything that comes back positive has to be tossed. We're talking hours upon HOURS of work here, enough bottles to feed my babies for weeks, IN THE TRASH. It breaks my heart.

But really, the absolute worst part of the whole thing is that I unknowingly passed the infection to my babies. They both have had blood cultures that came back positive for the klebsiella and I feel terrible. Really, I kind of feel like DFCS should just go ahead and step in and take them now because I'm obviously the worst mom in the world. IN. THE. WORLD. And I know logically that it's not my fault and that I didn't know and that there was nothing I should have or could have done different but still... I got my babies sick. My teeny tiny struggling fighting babies, who have it hard enough as it is, are sick because of me.

This "Mommy Guilt" is something serious, yall.

Luckily, they don't seem to be TOO affected by it. Their platelet counts have been low, which is easily remedied by transfusions, but they're both still active and their oxygen needs haven't changed much. The doctor said that he is really pleased with how the babies are handling it because this is an infection that has the potential to be kind of scary so we're hoping, praying, pleading and making deals with God that we've seen the worst of it and they won't get too sick.

When you say your prayers tonight, say a little prayer that my babies get better. And while you're at it, say a prayer that my boobs get better, too. We'd all appreciate it!

Strap Yourself In

I've heard the NICU stay described as a "rollercoaster" more than once. And damn if that isn't the truth.

Grayson's doing ok. He still HATES the machine but they've been giving him medicine to keep him sedated so he's much more comfortable than he was. And the GOOD news is that the oscillator is doing what it's supposed to do - his oxygen requirements are still high BUT his blood gases have been AWESOME since he's been on it and they've already been able to wean him down a little bit. So that's a bright spot! Hopefully his stint on it will be short.

Thank you thank you THANK YOU for all your prayers... they are being felt and heard and answered.

And then the up... I got to hold Audrey today for the third time! And I got to hold her for A WHOLE HOUR while they administered her feeding! And her sat levels (the amount of oxygen in her blood) stayed perfect THE WHOLE TIME!!! She's really prone to de-satting when she's being messed with so that is a HUGE deal. Preemie moms always say that they're surprised at how light their babies are, but for me it's the opposite; I excpect them to be terribly fragile, like an eggshell or a Christmas ornament, so I'm always taken aback by how solid they really are. And having her against me, feeling her settle into my chest and wiggle and breathe is just... there are no words for it. And I am SO thankful that although the moments don't come often enough, they come.

I love my babies so much. And I love you all for loving them too.

Tough Day

Grayson's having a tough day today.

His blood gasses (the amount of carbon dioxide in his blood) have been wonky today, and he wasn't responding well to all the normal interventions (raising his oxygen level, giving him extra breaths on his ventilator) so he had to be switched to a new kind of ventilator.

Here's a good overview I got from here

The sickest and tiniest babies and those who are no longer responding well to traditional ventilators are sometimes put on high frequency ventilators. These ventilators come in four types, but the one most frequently used in the NICU is the high frequency oscillatory ventilator, otherwise known as an oscillator. An oscillator uses a very high respiratory rate, typically between 120 and 480 breaths per minute, to move very small volumes of air. Babies on an oscillator appear to be vibrating from this rapid movement of air.

We're lucky really, this isn't a HUGE setback. It's not devastating news, it's not anything that he can't bounce back from. It's helping him, more than anything, and it's actually kind of a good thing.

It's just that he HATES it. He's fighting against it, and you can totally tell that he's not comfortable and REALLY not happy. They gave him some morphine to help calm him down a little and (hopefully) give him some time to get used to it.

In the NICU, the doctors and nurses all warn you that there will be bad days. You try to brace yourself for these bad days. You hold your breath, you say your prayers, you think you're ready... And then a bad day comes. And it hits you like a ton of bricks. And you realize you WEREN'T ready for it. There's no way anyone could every be ready for it. Watching your child in pain now nowthing there is NOTHING you can do to help him is the worst feeling in the entire world.

So please, when you say your prayers tonight, say a little one for my little guy. We'd all appreciate it.