Palpitations: The Beating Heart of Motherhood
Copyright © 2020 by Diane A. Kramer
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means- electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise- without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States copyright law.
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-0-9830336-5
Her adult life revolved around details, a constant and never ending barrage of checklists and calendar notes keeping track of the chaos that comes with raising six children conceived in a ten year span. She was indeed pregnant, nursing and potty training for a dozen years of her parenting life. Piles upon piles of laundry, brown bag lunches, and the daily grind of meal prep for eight, night after night, consumed her existence from dawn to dusk.
As her brood transitioned from babes to toddlers to tykes, tweens, and teens, mom did what extraordinary moms do. She evolved. She became the protector of our souls, the soft safety net we fell into, the teacher we required and the guidance counselor we sought. She was the taxi we took for granted, the cheerleader to our challenges, the editor of our language (spoken and written), the arbiter of our battles and the disciplinarian to our mischief. Always the angel on our shoulder, she was the constant in our chaos, the wind beneath our wings, the jovial guardian of our joys and the solace to our sorrows.
Moreover, even in the midst of raising her family, my mother remained true to herself. Somehow she managed to carve out time for her passions; nourishing her creative soul so as not to lose herself in her role as a mother. From her I learned about the importance of cultivating my own interests so that I could be better equipped to nurture others. I always knew that I was unique; that I was always enough. She knew our individual hearts as only a mother can and carefully guarded them as precious gifts worthy of all of her love. My mother was extraordinary and growing up all I ever really wanted to be was a mom because of her.
Two days before my mother passed away I made a promise to her. I promised her I would do what she had often urged me to do in the past ten years. She thought I should write a book. Perhaps, as mothers often do, she saw something in me, an untapped potential. Or perhaps she thought it would be “good for me,” cathartic in some way. It does not escape me that moms definitely have opinions on what might be “good for you” as we all know. In her wisdom, she did not push or insist; she simply encouraged me and upon her passing inspired me.
Since losing my mother in 2017, I have contemplated almost every day as to what I should write about. There are lots of things that I enjoy and that I feel I have some competency for.
At my core I am a creative person and a “domestic goddess,” if you will. I love DIY projects, designing and decorating homes, and all the hands on work that it entails. I have worked in the real estate world and have moonlighted designing homes for area builders. I have sold my crafted wares of beaded jewelry and crocheted baby clothing. I have owned and operated a family day care facility. I am a musician, performing in choral ensembles of one kind or another throughout my whole life. I have lived in 6 homes, built two of them and renovated one. In 39 years of marriage, I have raised 3 children and am presently “Nana” to four incredible grandchildren. I have led an ordinary life, not an extraordinary one.
Of all the experiences I have had so far in my life, the most meaningful and profound have been those related to my role as a mom. Indeed mothering has been “my jam.” It has always been my first and foremost career choice. It has challenged me, taught me, humbled me and shaped me into the person I am today.
In thirty -seven years of mothering to date, I have been many versions of a mom including: biological mom, adoptive mom, new mom, older mom, mom-in-law, adopted mom, confident mom, failing mom, super mom, and grandmother or more affectionately referred to as “Nana.”
These are the experiences I will share with the reader. Perhaps others will be able to relate to some of my stories. Perhaps some will even be touched; brought to laughter or possibly tears in the process. In any case, I feel Mom watching over me as I embark on making good on my promise.
Contents
One Risky Business
Two Birth Days
Three When the Rug is Pulled
Four In The Palm of My Hand
Five June 5th, 1985
Six The Disappearing Act
Seven Always in My Dreams
Eight Jiangxi Province, China
Nine The Switch
Ten Homecoming
Eleven Unimaginable Grief
Twelve Child of My Heart
Thirteen It’s Not Fair!
Fourteen Palpitations Run Amok!
Fifteen Best-laid Plans
Sixteen Before I Was a Mom…
Seventeen Roots to Wings
Eighteen Diplomas & Diamonds
***** 25 Years and Counting
Nineteen Climbing Out of the Dark
***** 30 Years Is a Long Time
Twenty Rite of Passage
Twenty- One Crossing Over Into Nanahood
Twenty-Two MTHFR
Twenty-Three Assault
Twenty-Four Wanting For Miracles
Twenty-Five Tatts n’ Spatts
Twenty-Six MIL
Twenty-Seven Milestones Miles Apart
Twenty-Eight Mirror, Mirror, On the Wall
Twenty-Nine My Worst Nightmare
Thirty Twice as Nice
***** Letter To My Mother
Thirty-One Somewhere Over the Rainbow
***** Final Thoughts
The events shared in this book are true and accurate depictions of the joys and challenges that have been a part of my motherhood journey. However, three chapters that impart the narrative of my daughter’s birth mother are fictional writings as little is known about her actual circumstance. Although these three episodes are works of fiction, I created them inspired by some known information and bits and pieces of other gathered facts and notions that I have collected over the past 25 years. Despite the fact that these chapters are imaginary accounts, I believe in my heart that the circumstances depicted are, to a measured degree, plausible. These chapters were included in my book because the woman who gave birth to the child who is my daughter has had a huge impact on my motherhood journey. I have always felt an intrinsic connection to her and am grateful that she gave life to the daughter that I call my own.
For my three amazing children
who made me a Mom,
a teacher,
a nurse,
an arbiter,
a taxi driver,
a counselor,
a cheerleader,
a warrior,
a worrier,
an advocate,
a better human being,
and a Nana.
And for my husband
who loves me in the best and worst of times.
It was a cool crisp October day in 1977 when I found myself hunkered down on the floor of a very small, stripped- out version of an airplane with three of my most outrageous friends. I had a parachute strapped to my body, a helmet securely strapped under my chin, heavy hiking boots laced half way up my calf, and I remember feeling like I just might have to use the bathroom at any moment. (Similar to when mom used to get you all bundled up for a day of sledding or ice-skating, and then as soon as you hit the cold, you just had to go!) I remember wondering at the time, what in heaven’s name was I doing. Had I completely lost my mind? Would they ever find me after I landed “splat” somewhere below? What would Mom and Dad say? In my head, I could hear their solemn voices. She must have been ill. We didn’t see the signs. She was obviously out of her mind. Kansas is an odd place you know. It does things to people. And, I remember thinking for a brief moment that maybe it was true; maybe I had lost my marbles.
At 3800 feet somewhere over the wheat fields of a Kansas prairie, my accomplice and instructor smiled at me and held out his hand to me indicating it was my turn. Suddenly terror coursed through my veins. But, of course, I couldn’t turn back now. My girlfriend had already jumped; risking her life for this pact we made to jump out of an airplane. I wasn’t going to be the disingenuous friend who betrayed her. So reluctantly I scooted over to the gaping hole in the plane located just over the wing. Checking my static line first, I tugged on it, then grabbed onto the wing of the plane and stepped out onto the struts. Gripping the crossbar in white-knuckle fear, I could hear my heart pounding over the sound of the plane engine. The air tugged at me and I could not catch my breath. I remember repeating the drill I had learned over and over in my head: arch, one thousand, look, one thousand, reach, one thousand, pull, one thousand, five, one thousand, six, one thousand, seven, one thousand, check your chute!
It had a rhythm to it, like a familiar song one might recite over and over to placate oneself and evoke a sense of calm. I am not sure that calm was really possible on this particular adventure. I am sure I recited the Lord’s Prayer instead, just in case. Next I felt an encouraging pat on my behind and the voice of my instructor yelling over the rush of the wind and the drone of the metal can that transported me to this precarious point.
“Okay, you’re good to go. It’ll be great, trust me. You’re prepared for this. Jump. NOW!” I released my hands from the aircraft, kicked back my legs and watched the plane fly off without me.
I jumped with an adrenaline rush I am sure cannot ever be duplicated, in this life anyway. I am not sure, that first time, if I really got up to seven one thousand; but I did check my chute! With a quick yank my chute unfolded and I was tugged up and up and up as I spread my body out trying to achieve the most beautiful arch I could muster amidst my panic. It hovered over me, an army green and orange striped umbrella, protecting me and lowering me gently to the earth below, far below where pastures dotted with ponds and miniscule mooing cattle slowly came into my focus.
As I was drifting and still wondering if I would survive this insane risky business, an incredible peace enveloped me. I was floating on air. There was not a sound to be heard. Even the sound of the airplane engine was long gone. In that moment, I felt God’s arms wrapped around me and I knew I was going to be okay. I was completely alone but not lonely, completely free and untethered, but surprisingly calm. I think I experienced a little bit of heaven on that jump in the fall of 1977, and two weeks later, before the weather would turn cold and blustery, “oops, I did it again.”
Admittedly this was a bit of a crazy time in my young adult life. I was 20 and in my junior year at the University of Kansas. I jumped out of an airplane twice that fall just as I was simultaneously meeting my future husband who refused to watch me “go splat” on the earth when I invited him to witness my second jump. He thought me a bit of a lunatic, I think. Still, he married me 2 ½ years later.
Do I regret having jumped out of a plane at 3800 feet above the earth? No. Would I parachute out of a gutted metal tube again? Negative. Would I encourage my children to do the same? Never. For that is how motherhood changes you. It reels you into a world of safety first, protective measures, and a penchant for nurturing that precludes dangerous and irresponsible choices.
However, in reality, I have found motherhood to be no less exhilarating and, at times, equally as daunting as jumping out of an airplane. Both require fearlessness and a willingness to plunge into the unknown. Both dare you to meet challenges that force you beyond your comfort zone. And both give you palpitations along the way. Skydiving and motherhood require you to free-fall into the future with a willingness to be cast out from all certainty. Indeed both endeavors necessitate a leap of faith taken with the required notion that, in doing so, you surrender control to a higher power much of the time. If you don’t, indeed, you may well fall “splat!”
Birthdays, the celebratory events marking the number of years each of us has survived on the planet, belong to all of us. But, I believe Birth Days belong to mothers. After all, there is much to remember and memorialize about the childbirth experience, each one a unique and awesome moment in a woman’s life that she never forgets no matter the outcome. And so, as children (and adults alike) are reveling in balloons and packages, cupcakes and candles, I believe moms are celebrating in their own secret space, remembering the actual day of birth that renders these annual parties an inalienable right of the human race.
June 18th, 1982
The clock above the nurses’ station ticked onward towards 11:00 pm as Johnny Carson wrapped up his monologue. Right on target, at five-minute intervals, I felt the surge of contractions gripping my abdomen once again. Breathe, pant, pant, pant, blow. Breathe, pant, pant, pant, blow. Labor had been progressing slowly at home for most of the day until we had finally checked into the hospital at about 6: 30 pm, (largely to escape the incessant phone calls from well- intentioned folks feeling the need to monitor the timing of my contractions since they had begun earlier that morning). So far so good, except for the fact that I was only three centimeters dilated after laboring for the entire day and then some. Relatively confident and comfortable, we hunkered down watching late night television and the screen on the monitor anticipating the next contraction.
Resting my eyes I retreated to my quiet place, that focal point they encourage you to have in your arsenal as you devise your “birth plan.” Mine was on the beach at the base of Big Sandy, a huge sand dune on the shoreline of Lake Michigan. There I burrowed my whole body into the warm squishy sand and felt the heat of the sun wash over my face. Gentle waves crested and folded like soft white sheets billowing in the wind until finally lying softly upon the earth. In my quiet space I listened for the sound of the lake pushing onto the shore and then pulling back into itself like a snail into its shell. Breathe, pant, pant, pant, blow. As the next contraction interrupted my tranquil moment, I was in control, thinking that this birthing rite of passage wasn’t so difficult and feeling proud of how formidable I felt. A piece of cake, I surmised. No wonder my mom went on to have six children. I felt that I had inherited her innate capability for this and was up to the challenge. Now if we could just get on with it!
Throwing wide open the door to our private room, the doctor on call strode in with a big toothy grin and extended his hand for shakes all around while introducing himself. Disappointed that my ob-gyn was not going to witness this great event that “we” had been preparing for during the past 7-½ months, I felt a bit unnerved and cheated. Nonetheless, no one asked me how I felt about it. Instead this new doctor, whom I had never met, proceeded with boundless energy asking, “So, how we feeling in here?”
“Ah, well ok I guess,” I replied. He really wasn’t listening for a response from me. Instead he nimbly swiveled a seat around to the end of my bed and proceeded to lift the sheet from my lower extremities and, at the same time, declaring, “Let’s take a look here!”
“Ah…ok?” I sheepishly replied as pressure mounted with another contraction and I panted my way through to the end of it. Then, as if I had just lost all control of a full bladder, a whoosh of amniotic fluid burst from my loins as he proclaimed to me proudly, “There, that should get things in motion!” And it did. In less than fifteen minutes I went from three to eight centimeters and we were on the move.
Nurses shuffled in and out of my room, tossing gowns, masks and booties to Daddy, smiling at me and exclaiming all around, “Well, here we go!” In between contractions, now much stronger and closer together, a team of delivery personnel hoisted me on the count of three to another gurney and off we went to the delivery room.
This was it. I was to become a mother, for real. This child coming very soon was everything I had ever wanted, and being a mom was all I had really ever wanted to be. Despite college degrees and a multitude of job experiences, this was my career choice. All of my life I had practiced for this role and had dreamt of the moment when I would hold my own child in my arms. I was excited and I was terrified and quite suddenly I was no longer in control of my contractions.
They came one after another, intensifying in strength, and I doubted if I really could manage this time of transition. Panting and blowing was all I could muster and focusing on anything but the agonizing spasms of my pregnant belly was impossible. So much for soothing naps on sandy beaches. No time for that, it was time to push! This little guy was bursting into the world and I was just a vessel for this astounding miracle, this son of ours.
He came to us a perfect gift, an acknowledgment of our love and God’s grace. Time stood still as the nurse laid my new son on my chest, all gooey and swaddled and sporting a bounty of dark hair. Eyes opened and cheeks ruddy red, our son drew us into a private cavity where no sounds or bright lights could detract from the awe that consumed us. He was for both of us our greatest achievement to date and the most precious of all of God’s creatures, all 8 pounds, 3 ounces of him.
In this moment I came to know the fierce and unconditional love of a mother. For the first time it became clear to me the love my mother had for my siblings and me the instant we were born, a love so incomprehensible and deep that it cannot be understood until you become a mom. He was such a joy to behold at 12:55 in the early morning of June 18, 1982.
As dark night gave way to the mystical peach glow of sunrise, I drifted in and out of dreamy naps. Pure exhaustion forced me into unconsciousness while, at the same time, love-driven adrenalin pumped through my veins generating in me an ebb and flow of rest and revelation. My new son, now nestled into my breast, slept sweetly as I studied every inch of his tiny face and fists. He had at once turned my world upside down, and I was a completely different person than I was the day before.
From this day forward I would be his mom, and we would forever be connected and entangled in the fabric of our lives yet to be woven. In this breathtaking moment in time we could not comprehend the adventures in store for us. What I did know was that, for the foreseeable future, I would be his sun, his moon, and his stars, and for always he would be mine.
Two days later as they wheeled me out of the hospital with my son in my arms, I remember gleefully proclaiming as we pushed through the massive turnstile doors, “I’ll be back!” Three years later I made good on my promise.
November 25, 1982
Thanksgiving Day didn’t disappoint. It had been a long day of family togetherness accompanied by the proverbial feeding trough of tom turkey and sides. Candied yams smothered in golden toasted marshmallows, sausage stuffing, space cranberries, green bean casserole, jello salad laced with pineapple, more marshmallows and cool whip, and of course the standard pumpkin, pecan and apple pies rendered most of the family unfit for any other social gathering. Reclining on couches and floors, those who failed to wear the appropriate sweatpants could be found with zippers down and shirttails out disguising the bloat that comes from gluttony. What is it about Thanksgiving that compels everyone to gorge them selves like it was their last meal on the planet? I suppose for some it might be, but that’s just unfortunate timing; or fortunate, I suppose, depending upon one’s point of view.
Nevertheless, it was the first Thanksgiving for our little guy at just 5 ½ months old. The youngest member of the family and our first child, he captured everyone’s attention throughout the day, bouncing on knees and scooting about in his red and white bouncy walker that barely allowed his toes to touch the floor. Always smiling with his big dimples and deep blue eyes, he stole the hearts of aunts, uncles and cousins.
We had morphed easily from a couple into parents and we felt in control of our new situation. The past five months had gone smoothly. Our little man was growing well, hitting or surpassing milestones at every pediatric check up. Breastfeeding was effortless and milk was plentiful. Poops were “healthy” and frequent. Distressing and unattractive hormonal rashes that often plague a nursing infant had cleared up (the one that clearly upsets mom more than anyone else) and we had resumed our relentless photo taking of the cutest baby boy that ever was. Life was good. We were good and he was jovial except for a runny nose most of the day. Teething or cold, it was hard to know, but we wanted to get back to our quiet cocoon of a home and recover from the day’s festivities. Packing up the diaper bag and passing him around so everyone could plant a kiss on his irresistible cheeks, we departed; ready to officially begin the holiday season leading up to his first Christmas.
November 26, 1982
The barking woke me with a jolt a little past midnight. We didn’t own a dog but the sound was a familiar one to me. As a teen I had cared for a pair of twins that were prone to developing croup (the childhood illness that produces a tell tale barky cough), and often I had tented their cribs to trap the moisture of a humidifier inside, helping to relieve their symptoms. It’s an alarming sound coming from such a little person and I immediately jumped out of bed and ran to his room. He had been fine all day, happy and without any discernible symptoms except for a slightly runny nose. Now, in just a few hours, he was struggling for breath.
His tiny chest heaved, drawing shallow breath that created a whistling wheeze, followed by an incessant barky cough that turned his little face beet red. Knowing the protocol for dealing with this, I promptly scooped him up and dashed into the bathroom, calling for my husband to stand by. I ran the shower as hot as it would go and sitting on the toilet seat, babe on my shoulder, the three of us confined ourselves in the bathroom as the steam swirled around us, fogging up the mirrors and invading our lungs.
Breathing slowly and methodically myself, I tried to calm my little guy, rocking and shushing through his spasmodic coughing. So tired and alarmed at the environment he found himself in, he wouldn’t settle. He seemed to panic, and I was certainly unsettled myself. Something didn’t seem right to me. This was croup, but it was more than I had ever experienced, and I had seen this first hand quite a bit. I told my husband to call the pediatrician.
“Really?” he questioned me. I balked for a moment, considering that I might be overreacting, new mom and all.
“Yes, really. There is something not right here,” I retorted. Dutifully he did so and leaving a message for the on -call doctor that we believed this was an emergency, we waited for a return call. Meanwhile, our little one was struggling, drifting into slumber for mere moments before returning to a labored breathing that unnerved me. Moments later our pediatrician did call back and after listening to my husband describing the events of the night thus far, he assured us that it was croup and we were doing the right thing.
“It can be scary for new parents, but he should respond soon, so just try to relax,” he told my husband. I already knew that. But I also knew better; something else was going on here. He suggested I try to nurse, thinking that might calm our baby down and allow him to breathe in the steamy air more efficiently. Pretty sure that this was an exercise in futility, I attempted to nurse him. He couldn’t latch, couldn’t seem to breathe, and within a minute or so his head drooped backwards, his eyes glazed over, and he seemed to turn a bit blue. Hoisting him up to my shoulder I patted him furiously and screamed, “Call 911 now!”
Minutes seemed to drag on as we waited for the ambulance. In the meantime we called my Dad in Chicago, a longtime pediatrician. He assured me our doctor was correct; it was probably croup and we should try not to be too alarmed, etc.
“Dad,” I responded, “I know this is croup, but it’s more than that. I’m taking him in. Ambulance is almost here!” With that we hung up at 1:00 a.m. and the paramedics arrived at our door. They were calm and trying to calm me at the same time.
“You’ve done the right things tonight. He seems to be breathing much better now. Are you sure you want to take him in?” I began to feel foolish, a bit embarrassed as new moms do when confronted by professionals who speak as if they know your baby as well as you do. My head quarreled with my heart as my husband seemed to surrender the decision to me. But something nagged at me. Was it mother’s intuition? An angel? Whatever the case, my heart won over. We called our pediatrician back and told him we were bringing him in to the ER. I was not backing down and could not be persuaded otherwise. He capitulated and agreed to meet us there. We boarded the ambulance with a bit of trepidation and arrived at the emergency room not as sure of our parenting prowess as we had been the day before.
The next few hours were a bit of a blur: medical personnel racing around us, ushering us to a waiting room, assuring us the doctor would be with us soon after he assessed the situation. Even so, I felt calmer just being at the hospital, confident that whatever was the case, they would be able to handle it and bring my baby back to his happy, healthy self. I had grown up in a medical family and I had confidence in the power of medical professionals to “fix” things. At the very least, to be absolved of the sole responsibility of my son’s well being that night, to hand off what I could not handle in that moment, to rely on the expertise and support of others was a relief to me. I was exhausted and I trusted that we were in the right place now so I could relax a bit.
After about half an hour, our pediatrician wandered into the room where we had been anxiously waiting. The look on his face was not what I was used to at our baby checkup appointments. He was not the jovial man that exuded “I love my job” in his practice. Instead his demeanor was somber and a little scary. My heart skipped a few beats as he shook our hands and apologized for seeing us under such “dire” circumstances. We followed him onto the elevator and he pushed the button that would deliver us to the intensive care unit, not a good omen. The walls of the elevator seemed to close in on me as he began to solemnly outline the plan for our child’s care.
“You were right to bring him in”, he confessed. For starters, he went on to say that our son was “gravely ill.” At the moment they were not completely sure of his diagnosis and were running tests to try to pinpoint what was going on. They had to intubate him and there were a number of tubes hooked up to our little guy “so don’t be alarmed when you see him. His vocal chords are separated by the tube, so there won’t be any sound when he cries. This is normal.” This is normal? My head was spinning and my heart pounding out of my chest. This was not normal! Nothing was normal. My baby was “gravely ill.” What was normal about that? I could barely keep track of all that our pediatrician was regurgitating to us. Medical word salad was all I heard in the elevator ride to hell.
Jolting to a sudden stop, the huge stainless elevator doors parted. Stepping out, we were escorted down a long colorless hall following a huge directional sign that seemed to scream INTENSIVE CARE UNIT. Pausing outside another pair of oversized doors, our doctor scanned his ID causing the locks to open and waved us in behind him.
Inside the ward patients were adults. No children were visible and I was confused. Where were the cribs, the bassinets, the bright colors and magical murals dancing off the walls, flaunting a certain degree of whimsy in otherwise stressful pediatric hospital wings? Had we gotten off on the wrong floor? Again, nothing was normal. Perhaps I was dreaming. I hoped to wake up from this nightmare soon. Nothing felt right.
Our son was not in a private room, but rather in a large space with many beds divided up into curtained off “cubicles.” Upon entering, we noticed a large elderly man who had recently suffered a heart attack and next to him a woman heavily sedated for who knows what. Seeing the confusion in our eyes, our doctor explained to us that there were not any open beds left in the pediatric intensive care unit so they had to bring our son here. Besides, they decided he might be less prone to additional infection in this ICU as most of these patients were not carrying illnesses but were generally victims of organ failure, accidental falls and the like. The scenario was odd, and I tried not to look around for fear of invading the privacy of the elderly patients. My only concern was where was my baby boy in all of this?
Finally, at the very far end of a cul-de-sac of beds we stopped outside a sectioned off “room,” its curtained walls drawn completely closed, shutting it off from the rest of the chaos that existed all around us. Quietly the doctor pushed back the drapes and tiptoed into the space leading us to our sick child’s crib. In that instant, seeing our son for the first time since we had arrived at the hospital, it was as if a rug had been pulled out from beneath us, leaving us unsteady and shaken. It was all we could do not to collapse to our knees.
He lay there, looking so tiny and frail, tubes running into his nose and down his throat. They had strapped his head and hands to the crib to render him incapable of dislodging the tubes which opened his airway and silenced his voice box. His little chest rose and fell rhythmically as machines forced his lungs to inhale and exhale. A clear plastic bag filled with fluids hovered over him, delivering saline to his infant veins through the needle taped and wrapped securely in place on his pudgy forearm. He appeared like a miniscule prisoner tied down by all sorts of restraints, surrendering to his demise. As we hung on to the rail of his crib, stunned and shocked at our new reality, the doctor attempted to explain his theory to us.
“I am so sorry. Cultures we have taken will most likely confirm that your son is suffering from acute laryngotracheobronchitis, otherwise referred to as acute bacterial croup. This is a relatively rare syndrome, and it is extremely serious. Honestly, I have never seen it before in all my years of practice. So, through his IV I have started him on an arsenal of antibiotics to cover all our bases in battling this infection. In the meantime we will be keeping him intubated and we will also need to suction out the developing mucus in his lungs on a regular basis. This, in conjunction with the severe edema, threatens to block his larynx and bronchi. I know this is very frightening for you. Do you have any questions for me at this point?” Bewildered, we stared in disbelief at the doctor standing across from us.
“But how could this happen?” I asked. “He’s been just fine and he hasn’t even run a fever.”
“Well, that is a problem,” he went on to explain. “No fever simply indicates that his body is not fighting the infection, so we will have to help him do so with an array of antibiotics, high humidity, suctioning of secretions, and oxygen. I know this is a lot to take in. Just know that we are doing everything we can to manage this.”
Flustered and exhausted we both sat down next to the crib and watched over our little boy, so vulnerable and almost lifeless in front of us. The worst nightmare any parent could have was knocking down our door, haunting us and draining us of any power to help our child. Guilt and blame began to invade our psyche as we wondered what we had done wrong to cause this to happen to our baby. Why would we be blessed with such a perfect child only to be threatened by the possible loss of him at just 5 ½ months old? This just couldn’t be happening. There had to be some mistake, some flaw in the diagnosis. But leaning over my baby, caressing his face around the myriad of tape and tubes crisscrossing his pale cheeks, resignation gripped me as I realized that we had just been inducted into the hall of powerless parents, couples whose children were “gravely ill” and whose future hung in the balance; mothers and fathers who were helpless, fighting hopelessness, and who needed prayers.
As hours dragged on, night became morning, though we could only tell by the clock on the wall. The bright lights and constant pinging of alarms throughout the ward made sure that no one rested. Unless someone succumbed to their final resting place, there was no escaping the barrage of shuffling about, whispered groans, or angry outbursts. It felt strange to be in the midst of adults with our tiny person, so young and fragile. All through the night we kept a constant wide -eyed vigil on our son, watching every rise and fall of his breath. Nurses checked in on us regularly, noting every monitor, checking every tube running in and out of our little patient. They seemed grateful to have a baby amongst them, a sweet defenseless infant to fuss over. I imagine that, for them, caring for our son was a welcome reprieve from the cranky, complaining geriatric patients on the ward. Feeling a bit misplaced, we just hoped that they were well versed in pediatric care and knew what they were doing.
Throughout the night my son would open his baby blues and stare up at me as if begging me to pick him up and hold him. So many tubes to negotiate, it just wasn’t feasible yet. So, putting my lips upon his forehead I whispered lullabies mixed with soft kisses. Tears spilled out the corners of his eyes, trickling down and meandering around his precious earlobes as his mouth stretched open into a silent cry. “Shhh… my sweet boy,” was all the mothering I could manage in those moments when the heartache inside of me caused my own tears to mix with his.
The suctioning out of copious and tenacious secretions was the most agonizing of procedures for him and for us. As we stood close and held his miniature fists, trying to calm and distract him, the nurse gingerly snaked another tube within the tracheal tube down into his bronchi to suction out what were nasty streams of snot jeopardizing his ability to breath. During the interminable seconds it took to accomplish this, his airway was obstructed momentarily and it seemed he would choke to death as he struggled for air. All this occurred without any sound as his vocal chords were compromised. It was all I could do not to completely fall apart every time. This occurred every hour at least and was torture for all of us.
Early rounds started at 7 a.m. and after only a few hours’ sleep, if any, our doctor soberly strode into our curtained cocoon. Blurry -eyed but all business, he poked and prodded here and there, grilled the nurses for information, and talked to our son through a gentle smile. He proceeded to inform us that they would be taking some more labs, checking his white blood count to see if the antibiotics had been effective. He wanted to pull the intubation tube out sooner than later because the irritation of it was a problem in itself. Perhaps by this afternoon they could attempt that, he proposed. “Let’s see how the day goes.” He suggested we get a bite to eat and perhaps a bit of rest as we had been up for at least 24 hours. Looking at each other, we knew we were not going anywhere.
Reeling and overwhelmed, I wanted to call my Dad but I was so exhausted. Sharing that my father was a pediatrician in Chicago, I asked our doctor to call him and explain what was happening with his grandson. I hoped that they could converse in clinical terms and Dad would be much better informed than if I had tried to explain anything in the emotional state I was in.
“Sure, I’d be happy to,” he replied. “Now, both of you, at least go grab some coffee and a bit of breakfast downstairs. We’ll watch over this little guy.” I felt my chin start to quiver as we stared down the nurse in the room, wanting assurance that nothing awful would transpire while we slipped out. She smiled sweetly and nodded affirmatively that all would be well.
Taking each other’s hand and with a huge sigh, we kissed our son, told him mommy and daddy would be right back, and reluctantly left the room. Once in the elevator that had delivered us to and from evil, we fell into each other, sad, spent and silent.