I spent the day reliving the past 2+ months. I couldn't help it, it just stayed in my mind all day long. I couldn't get it off my mind. That Wednesday in October, the terrifying feelings we had as we wondered if our baby boy was even going to make it through delivery. The scary information and overwhelming facts being thrown at us rapid fire about what was happening to me and my baby. The fear when they took me away from my family and Scott that Thursday to perform my Cesarean operation and I was all alone in an operating room full of people I didn't know. The fear of them telling me that I was too far for any pain medication so they would have to fully sedate me. Hearing Dr. Bodner say "as soon as she's out I'm cutting, we don't have time" sent me into a frightening panic attack but before I could do or say anything I had the mask over my face and after two breaths I was gone.
I woke up about 20 minutes later as the nurses were removing my breathing tube. I felt like I was suffocating to be honest. I couldn't breathe! All I could think in that moment is - I am going to suffocate to death and never see my baby. I started having another panic attack. The realization of everything that had happened to me was beginning to set in. The nurses finally calmed me enough that I could breathe and they were letting me have dry ice chips. I was dehydrated and starving. I hadn't eaten since 4pm on Wednesday afternoon. I had to stay in recovery about 45 minutes total so I was also trying to come to fully from that sedation they gave me. Scott was standing beside the bed and he was telling me he loved me. So very much. So I held his hand and he cried. He told me how proud he was of me for staying strong during these last crazy hours. He squeezed my hand and I looked up at him. I asked him if Luke was ok. He said he is fine but he is very very tiny. Then my heart sank. I asked where he was. Scott said they took him immediately to the NICU but before they snapped a quick photo of him. I have it here for you. I wanted you to see him first thing. So Scott handed me a picture of Luke and his two perfect footprints and I cried at the sight of my sweet baby boy. He was perfect in every sense of the word. I didn't look at him and see a 1lb baby, I looked at him and saw perfection. His nose, his eyes, his lips, his arms and legs, hands and feet, fingers and toes, his eyelashes. Everything was perfect on him.
Twelve hours after my surgery I was able to see Luke for the first time. This would have been midnight on the 5th. Scott was asleep, as he should be after all we had been through. Neither one of us had slept since we checked into Northside at 9pm Wednesday night. I had an awesome nurse that night. She was the greatest I've ever had. She came in at midnight on the dot - it was time for my pain pills anyway - and asked me if I was ready. I looked at her and said "Nothing will keep me from seeing him now". Brought tears to my eyes because I had been waiting so long. I was so anxious because I didn't know what I was going in to either. So she helped me raise my bed, get my legs over the side and sit up straight for a minute. I had a lot of pressure so she clicked my morphine button twice and said we would click it again when we got to the nursery. I stood up, walked 5 steps, and sat down in the wheelchair. SUCCESS! She laid a blanket over my legs and we were off. Scott was up too and right behind us.
I can't describe the level of emotion I reached when I saw Luke for the first time. He was just as beautiful as I had imagined. My love. My heart lying in his isolette. He was the tiniest but sweetest baby I had ever laid eyes on. And in that instant the love exceeded any expectation I had of it before all of this happened. Luke became my best friend in that minute. I loved him more that I loved myself.
So that is how I was given Luke, It wasn't the best ticket in but it got him here nonetheless and the destination may not have been what we had hoped for but the ride there was an amazing one. Luke did so many things that I would be here forever recalling every single wink or kick that he did. Luke is mine and he always will be. I don't have him in the flesh but I have him in the spirit. His spirit is in my heart and soul. He is with me.
When Luke was taken from us on November 11th, my world fell apart. My best friend was gone in an instant. All I could do was replay every minute and note all the things we would never get to do together. I held my poor Luke until he took his last breath and that almost killed me as well. I watched his eyes float away to the Heavens. I knew he was gone. But I couldn't let go. I cried. I cried. I cried. I yelled why, I screamed for help, I begged and pleaded for someone to save my son's life for me. Save it for me because I can't live without him. I tried to rub his back - I had seen nurses do that with the apnea prone preemies and they always came back. I tried placing him over my heart to see if that would stimulate his to beat again. Anything. I would have done anything. I would have put my own heart into him to save him from leaving this world. But he was gone.
And now what's left? I miss him. I miss him every time I think about being pregnant. I miss him everytime I see a photo of my pregnant belly. I miss him when I look at the photos we have of him after birth. I miss him when I see commercials for pregnancy items or children's items. I miss him when I see a mother with her baby and they are cuddled up together. I miss him when the dogs do a funny trick because he is supposed to be here and his laughter is supposed to fill the room when they act funny. I just miss him period.
“Yours is the light by which my spirit's born: - you are my sun, my moon, and all my stars.”
― E.E. Cummings
― E.E. Cummings
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