Thursday, January 17, 2013

A friend of mine wrote me a sweet message on Facebook. She said she felt impressed to share a poem with me that her sister was given when she had a baby that spent some time in the NICU. It touched me so much, I thought I would share it.

Welcome to Holland
By Emily Perl Kingsley
C1987 By Emily Perl Kingsley. All Rights Reserved.

"When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip- to Italy. You buy a bunch of guidebooks and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It’s all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, “Welcome to Holland.” “Holland?” you say, “What do you mean Holland? I signed up for Italy! I’m supposed to be in Italy. All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”
But there’s been a change in the flight plan. They’ve landed in Holland and there you must stay.
The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine, and disease. It’s just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
It’s just a different place. It’s slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you’ve been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.. and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills.. and Holland has tulips… Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy… and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say, “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away… because the loss of that dream is a very, very significant loss. But… if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things… about Holland."

So, here we are in Holland. Not quite Italy, but still beautiful nonetheless. Thanks for sharing Michelle!

Maks is having another good day! We just love when he behaves so well. :) They are continuing to slowly increase his feedings by 1ml every 24 hours, so today he is at 3ml every 3 hours. He is still on the hydrocortisone, but they are thinking that should completely tapered off within the next day or so because his blood pressure is staying up on its own. His labs have also remained good, so they are thinking about decreasing the frequency of those. That is a good thing, because every time they have a lab to draw, they have to poke his foot and really squeeze to get the blood they need. It will be much more comfortable for Maks if they don't have to do that so frequently.

In other news, I am so happy to report that my ankles get smaller every day, and I can finally see the veins in my feet! Even my face and hands feel and look better. It is such a relief to know the swelling is finally going down. It is also a relief to know that the swelling wasn't all in my imagination when I was still pregnant with Maks. I remember wondering and worrying about my sudden weight gain, but not really knowing that it was all fluid. It's nice to know that most of it was!


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