Author Raquel with her family.
Baby miracles change people. Mothers learn patience, self-control, endurance and, most of all, unconditional love. For the fathers who are searching for the true meaning of life there is a sudden understanding of what it’s all about.
But in the midst of such joy, when you’re experiencing a baby miracle, life can sometimes deal what appears to be a very cruel blow, for both the new baby and the proud parents.
Watching a tiny baby, who has just entered the world, fight for their life, is the most inspiring realisation you can receive.
Most women become members of a silent club when experiencing this kind of crisis or a traumatic event. All too often we are told we should be grateful just being alive, being healthy, having a baby, having a healthy baby, being able to try again to have another baby, or having had our baby for just a little while.
Unfortunately, some women do not survive and some women survive without their baby (or babies) and carry permanent emotional scars.
I believe that by sharing my story, along with the other special stories in this book, we may help someone who has gone through something similar. I have not written this book because I am a hero nor because I am a victim. I am just a woman who has been through some hard times and made it through to the other end.
You are not alone in your experience. As long as you have this book in your arms, consider this my arm around you for support. I have been where you are and you, soon, will be back to where I am, back in the world, I promise!
This is my second baby. I am 29 weeks pregnant. I am sitting on the toilet with blood everywhere. I can neither see nor breathe through the flood of tears and emotions. I have just enjoyed the day I have dreamt about for 12 months. Revealing to my friends and family a secret I had held close to my heart, the sale of my successful catering business.
Now at 9.00pm my day has suddenly changed focus. What is happening to my baby? Why am I bleeding? I can’t go through this again. My first daughter arrived six weeks early through complications with pre-eclampsia; surely this can not be the beginning of what I had been assured I would not go through again.
I pray. I cry. I panic. In the middle of this range of emotions, I question “Why am I going through this again?”
There is a reason for everything. Through the hours, days, weeks and months of my experience I realise what the reason is…to help other women, parents and mothers to be able to understand and cope with premature births, and to celebrate babies who are miracles.
Something good always comes out of something bad. Welcome to our journey.
The midwives and my family all looked on with smiles and tears of relief. I was trying to be brave for Kye, for Scott, for myself, but really, all I wanted to do was cry. I knew this moment was only going to last another minute and it was important to me that Kye heard my voice. To me this is the moment, other than leaving your baby in hospital when you go home, that is the hardest part of having a premature baby. You have the mother’s instinct to bond with, and be with, your child, yet you are restricted in every way. I felt a great sense of guilt that I had brought Kye into this world, only to leave him without my touch, my smell, my voice, my motherly instinct. I kept thinking he must be so afraid of his unfamiliar surroundings, the monitors, the voices and the pain from the insertion of every needle.
How did he know I was his mother, his comforter, his love and support? He needed me, I needed him.
Everyone was so relieved to have Kye arrive safely, as was I, but I felt this was overshadowed by the fact that this was not a normal birth. There was no reason to celebrate at this point, we had only just started. It was important to acknowledge that pre-eclampsia had not taken our lives and acknowledge the relief of a successful delivery, but it was also important for me to keep my focus.
Scott wheeled me to see Kye for the second time since the day he was born, three days ago. The midwife wrapped two large blankets around his fragile body and placed his tubes, monitors and drips inside the blanket. He was as light as a feather, his head no larger than a tennis ball and he was covered in fine, soft blonde hair. Kye was placed in my arms. This was the very first time I held my baby – what a special moment. It felt like the world had stopped, I could not hear Scott or the midwives or the other babies in the room. I was in awe of Kye. I observed his tiny features and noticed the marks from the tape on his face which made me think how painful it would have been to remove the tape from his tiny face. Instinctively I felt I should remove the marks, yet hesitated.
I felt overwhelmed by his size, the tubes, the small features, his body covered in test spots and his drip. I felt faint and I started to perspire in a cold sweat. It was all too much. Scott noticed my reaction and the loss of colour in my face. I was about to vomit and needed help. Kye was taken from my arms, as I regained myself.
Scott wheeled me back to my room to rest. It was nearly midnight and he tucked me into bed. I went to bed feeling the lowest of lows. In the morning, I woke with the joy of my milk arriving. My boobs were the size of watermelons, I could not place my arms by my sides.
I walked up to the Nurses Station to search for an express machine and one of the midwives asked how I was feeling. It was the first time anyone had asked me how I was really feeling and it opened a flood gate of tears. It was the first time since the birth of Kye that I had cried.
From Miracle Beginnings by Raquel Bosustow. Published by Jane Curry Publishing.
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