Many of you have probably read this in the past. In some ways, it is hard for me to believe that it has been five years ago since this horrific day. I can honestly say that I can still hear the sounds, see the sights, and feel the emotions just as much today as I could five years ago....
Motherhood is the best thing in the world. Motherhood can also be the worst. How helpless we feel when our babies are hurt and suffering and we can do nothing to help. A hot day in June 2007, a sterile hospital PICU room. My baby has been on life support for 3 days for pain relief. Everything looks good and she has been fighting her way out of sedation. All signs say that it is time to remove the life support and let her wake and breathe on her own. So Ryan and I stand near her bed, ready to try and soothe her as she comes to. The last time she saw us, she was being wheeled away to the operating room in tears. That was three days ago. This will be scary for her, we're sure.
The doctor pulls the ventilator tube. Her stats fall immediately. The machine is beeping frantically as she slips more and more in distress. The doctor yells for the bag - "we have to bag her now!" They place the bag on her mouth and it fills with blood. Her body is convulsing all over the table. Her poor, sore body that just went through utter hell under the knife. The machine is beeping even more frantically now. The doctor and nurses are all stressed yet like a well-oiled machine, work together to help save this life.
They try to make me leave. I refuse. I sit in a chair, holding Kelki (Kennedy's lovey), crying, and I refuse to leave. This wasn't supposed to happen. She was on life support for pain relief - not for life support! They have to tube her again but its hard to get the tube in. She's still convulsing due to her body fighting against lungs that held no air, she's completely blue in the face, her mouth and face are covered with blood, her stats are still near 0. In that moment, my baby is dead. In that moment, my world stopped turning. In that moment, I was experiencing the worst day, hour, minute of my life. I had never felt more scared, more helpless, and never more shaky in my faith. Her doctor finally got the tube back in. She stopped convulsing. Her stats started going back up. Color returned to her face. That doctor was my hero. Will always be my hero.
But what the hell happened? Her vocal cords had swelled immediately after the tube was pulled due to irritation from the tube. They blocked her airway entirely. And as her lungs were fighting for air, they were pulling blood in from every nook and cranny of her body. You've heard of a violent death? I had just watched one. And I hope that I never have to see another.
Things changed. Being on life support for pain relief vs. life support for living were entirely different ballgames. This one was by far the worst. And her several minutes without oxygen - what did that do to her brain? 6 looong days we waited. Many set-backs a long the way, many hours at the hospital, many sleepless nights. And then she fought her way out of sedation, she breathed on her own and it was time to try again. After 9 days on the vent and sedation drugs - you'd be surprised how much medicine kids require to keep them down - she was going to wake up. I made the agonizing choice to wait in the hall. Although, I wanted and needed to be there, I couldn't watch her die again. If this was going to be it, it was going to be a violent death again, not a peaceful one. I just couldn't face it. Ryan was with her and after what seemed like forever, the nurse finally came to tell me that someone needed Mommy. My angel was awake. And she remembered us. She went through hell and back after that - drug withdrawal as intense as a lifetime heroin user faces (nothing like a 5 year old needing heavy doses of Methadone), learning to walk, talk, and eat again, two more surgeries to fix and remove hardware, almost a month in the hospital, etc. Another day, another story.
A mother has to have faith in order to survive. I have faith in my family, in the doctors that are so entwined with our lives, and in guardian angels. And faith that children are angels themselves - created out of love and in need of nothing more than a mother's love. Motherhood can be the worst thing in the world. Motherhood can also be the best.
No comments:
Post a Comment