Love, Jessica
“Dear NICU Mama, You may not be the same woman you were before your NICU journey, but you are brave.
No matter how strong you are as a person, no mother is prepared to go home after labor and delivery empty-handed. It is the scariest, most unsettling feeling. But guess what? Mama, you are doing it. You are doing it for your baby, and you will do it as long as you have to for them to get stronger and come home.
When you see your baby taken to the NICU or transferred to another hospital, you are brave. You are brave when you leave your baby at night to go home and get some sleep only to come back to the NICU to watch your baby sleep under those scary machines and wires. You are brave when you call the NICU at 3am because you are up all night worried sick about them. Trusting strangers to care for your baby while you are gone is BRAVE.
If you can conquer this, you can do it all. Keep pushing through. Hold onto every gain and milestone, celebrate the small moments, and cherish the cuddles. Being a NICU mom is scary and overwhelming. Sometimes you may feel like you are crumbling and can't do this, and that’s okay. It's an emotional rollercoaster, but you showing up and being there for your baby is BRAVE. You are brave as hell. You got this, mama.”
Love,
Jessica
More of Jessica + Gage’s NICU Journey:
”Gage came into this world at 35 weeks on August 16th, 2019. He was everything we ever dreamed of, a perfect 7 lb boy we thought would come home with us. That night our world was turned upside down. Gage started vomiting green and became very ill. The nurses rushed in to examine him and run some tests. They quickly determined Gage had quite a few blockages in his intestines, so he was rushed to McMaster Children's Hospital. Gage went in for a 5-hour surgery, followed by a two month recovery stay. I will never forget walking down that cold, dark hallway to the surgery unit to meet the surgeon for an update. Not only was she standing there with a box of kleenex for my husband and I, she told us Gage had a 95 percent chance of having cystic fibrosis. I will never forget those words. The pain and fear in the moment was unbearable.
When the test results came back almost a month later, Gage was NEGATIVE for cystic fibrosis! I cried of joy and relief. During his two month stay he ended up with sepsis, which was not what we expected, but he was quickly treated with medication and on the road to recovery. After a long 84 days in the NICU, Gage was healthy and strong enough to come home. We still don't have a diagnosis, and we probably won't ever know what caused it. He is a happy healthy 18 month old, and he wouldn't be here today if it weren’t for those amazing doctors and nurses at McMaster Children's Hospital.”
