Acts of Love: How to Help

This past week one of my dear friends delivered her baby entirely too early...33 weeks if I'm not mistaken. And as I looked at the pictures of this friend and her teeny, fragile, wire-covered baby on facebook, it all came flooding back, as it often does....

I know I probably sound like a broken record. I've written about this before. The thing is, I just can't write about our experience of Kevin's birth enough. I'm not "over" it yet. I don't think I ever will be. I had no idea going in that I was going to come out not only as a mother, but as a completely changed woman. Once you've been there...to the room where babies are surrounded by other babies, most of them too small to even wear "premie" clothes, and beeping equipment and nurses rushing too and fro, soothing cries, checking medicine and tubes, and calming parents that can do nothing but sit and wait for time to pass and their baby to get stronger...well, if you haven't been there, you just don't know.

Scott and I often reflect on what we call our Utah Hospital Tour 2012 (three hospitals in three and a half weeks). We talk about the people that showed us love and concern. We talk about things that we didn't get that could have been helpful. We realized then, as we do now, that a lot of the people who could have helped us most just didn't know how to.  Mostly there were those, however, who found ways to help even when they didn't know what we were going through. I'd like to share their examples for anyone out there who has friends or family members in the NICU and just doesn't know where to start...

• Scott will never forget how, as he was following the ambulance that was taking me from Logan to Ogden, he called various family members to let them know what was going on. It brings tears to both of our eyes to think about how his brothers offered to drop everything and drive hours to come and sit with him. There were so many family members that came just be with us. My mom and aunt drove to Ogden in the middle of the night. Scott's parents brought a bag full of snacks. My dad took Scott out to dinner while my mom stayed with me. We were never alone.
• A couple from our ward stopped by the hospital the day after Kevin was born and brought us some homemade breadsticks. Not only was the homemade food much better than hospital food, they took the time to visit with us and admired our pictures when we had no baby to share with them. I think that is one of the hardest things as a NICU parent: you have a baby, but you just can't show her off to anyone besides her grandparents (if you are lucky). You don't get to keep her in your room at night or during the day. You don't get to have a say in when she goes to the nursery and when she is fed and when she is taken home. They tell you all that. So when somebody would ask us for what we did have...a picture of our gorgeous girl, we were more than happy to show her off!
• Our bishop and his wife came and visited us twice and checked in on us multiple times. Sister Dunkley brought us a little baby outfit, but she also knew that I loved reading, so she brought me a book. That book became a lifeline for me because reading is my outlet, and her gift gave me somewhere to escape when everything in my reality became too much. I read almost seven books while we were in the NICU with Kevin...and Sister Dunkley started all that.
• We received various texts and phone calls. Even though we couldn't always answer our phones (sometimes because we were with Kevin and sometimes because we just couldn't talk to people without breaking down and crying), those messages gave us strength and comfort. Facebook messages, although they felt a little less personal, also helped a ton! We felt not quite so alone when people made the effort to reach out to us and check on us and ask how our baby was doing.
• I had two friends (both of whom I hadn't talked to in about five years) offer us a place to stay when Kevin got moved to Primary's. Although we didn't take them up on their offers, I was so touched to know that they would invite us (rather an inconvenience, when both of them had multiple small children) into their homes so willingly. Along the same vein, my sister-in-law's parents let us crash at their house the night after Kevin was moved to Salt Lake since we hadn't had time to get a room at the Ronald McDonald House yet. They weren't home most of the time we were there, but it was so nice to have a real shower and a real bed and a place to be alone together while we learned to cope with our situation and figured out our next move.
• Both sets of our parents were just awesome. Although it was a drive and not easy for them, they visited at least every other day and usually made sure to take us out to dinner and get us out of the hospital for a bit. Sometimes they would come and spend time with Kevin and hold her so we could go and rest and know somebody we loved and cared for was taking care of her.  My aunt made multiple trips, even though for the first five days she couldn't see her namesake. My grandma even made a long trip down from Idaho Falls to meet her great-granddaughter. Our families made such sacrifices for us, and they didn't go unnoticed.
• On a particularly hard day, I received a surprise visit from one of the sisters in our ward, who just happened to be in town for a little while and decided to use her limited time to come and sit and talk with me, although she was eight months pregnant herself. She brought me a little plant, but more than that, she brought me love and friendship.
• My best friends, as usual, were completely in tune with my needs at this time. Not only did they text and call throughout each week, but one evening they all drove the 45 minutes to the hospital and took me out for Chinese food and threw me a surprise baby shower amid the fried rice and lo mein. They gave me courage and helped me to understand that I could handle this. One of them showed up at the hospital a few days later with a stack of books she knew I hadn't read. Another shared her NICU experiences with me and helped me to feel not quite so alone. She showed me the beauty in Holland while I was still mourning my lost trip to Italy. Her advice was my rope when I just needed something to hold on to as I struggled to keep going.
• My second parents (my parent's best friends) came and took us, along with my Mom and Dad, out to dinner one night. We loved being somewhere besides the hospital and we loved having a chance to just laugh and be happy and get our fill of food (yay for Sizzler!). I guess the one thing we could have always used more of: food. A gift card to go out to eat somewhere would be an awesome gift to send to parents of NICU babies--especially since you don't have time/effort to cook and eating out every day gets super expensive after about three days. At the same time, Scott and I craved simple, homemade meals like PB &J or spaghetti. If someone you know has a baby at the NICU and like us are away from home (or even if they are home), inviting them over for a home-cooked meal would be just plain awesome of you. Also, we could have used more meals when we finally brought Kevin home. Even though she was almost a month old, we were still getting used to being parents and we were far more exhausted than we would ever admit. I sincerely hope that Heavenly Father showers blessings down upon the three sisters in our ward who offered and brought meals even when no sign-up sheet was passed around at church. They saw a need and filled it without being asked. That is what being a Christian is all about.
• When we got home, our front porch was decorated (my family is good like that). It made being home that much more special. 
• We found out after we got home that our ward had held a special fast for our Kevin. We didn't know this was going on, but we were so very touched by the outpouring of love and the sacrifices that our ward family made to help our little family. We know that our miracles were a result of the fasting and prayers of many people who loved us--family, friends, and mere acquaintances.

This list could go on and on...I barely even skimmed the surface of the many acts of love that were shown to our family during an especially difficult time. Mostly we just needed to know we were not alone, and so many people were able to show us how much they cared by simply being there for us.

Now our baby is a healthy, busy, chubby little girl whose bangs I had to cut four days ago because she couldn't see with all that hair in her eyes. She is happy. She is thriving. She is an almost-walking miracle. And as of about a month ago, she has finally figured out how to go to bed at a decent time and sleep all the way through the night.

Sometimes her life is still tough. She will always have challenges. She will probably always be a little bit behind when it comes to some things, we just don't know which things yet.

We will always shudder when we think back to some of those experiences we had--especially those times when the doctors and nurses asked us to step into the hall because they didn't think we could handle what they were about to do to our baby. We couldn't have handled it, we know that (what parent could stand watching their two-day-old baby get her heart shocked back into a normal rhythm?), but I will never get over feeling guilty for leaving her alone during the times when I felt she needed me most. We will never forget what it felt like to sit there, day after day, and simply watch her breathe. We will never forget the joy of simply holding her--most parents take that for granted, or don't get to appreciate it as fully as I think NICU parents do. We will never forget crying the whole drive home with her because the car seat was no longer empty and she was all ours and we just couldn't believe it.

 

 

And over the past thirteen months, when we feel like sleepless nights and viruses and teething and temper tantrums are too difficult, we remember how blessed we are to have her home, and we lower our voices, show a little more patience, and give a few more hugs and kisses. And, like Alan Matthews in the season six finale of Boy Meets World, we say an extra prayer for anyone who has to be there.