*Warning*
You will cry so make sure you are comfortable with your environment while you watch this. For example, I made sure I was home alone and Jackson was asleep so he did not wonder why his mommy was an emotional mess. I believe babies pick up on these things. Same thing goes for the dogs. They always know when something is wrong.
Once I wiped myself off the floor and got myself together, I started thinking. Thanksgiving is less than a week away and I have so much to be thankful for I just can't save it for one day.
Here are just some of the things I am thankful for:
Colin
I know, you thought I would jump right to Jackson, but the truth is none of this would be possible without Colin. Get your mind out of the gutter; it goes so much deeper than the biological fact it takes two to make a baby. The minute I was checked into the hospital and was told my body was starting to shut down, he was immediately my hero. He refused to leave my side when I was sentenced to indefinite bed rest and did everything in his power to stay informed and advocate for me and Jackson. I asked him over and over to go home and get some sleep. The constant monitoring of my vitals and chasing Jackson around with the fetal monitor coupled with the uncomfortable couch he was "sleeping" on did not allow him much rest. Again, he refused to leave my side. When Jackson came, he was there waiting for him since I could not be there. There are touching photos and video of Colin and Jackson's first moments together and it is clear he offered him the love and reassurance I was unable to give at that moment. Colin learned how to help me pump milk and take care of the machine and its many parts. When I was unable to get out of bed, he was there helping me get my milk supply established by getting me set up with my pump every three hours, including in the middle of the night. He would face the frightening NICU to take Jackson my milk and come back to report how he was doing.
When we finally got out of the hospital, Colin left work throughout the day (with his boss' permission of course!) to join me in the NICU learning how to care for our little preemie and spend time bonding through kangaroo care. He did everything in his power to encourage me and be a sounding board during a difficult time as I was spending all day in a little room with my baby. He comforted me when I was sad because I had to leave my baby every night. At home, Colin is a loving and attentive father and supportive and encouraging husband. Unfortunately, he spends most of his day at work (someone has to make some money!) but when he comes home he is always ready to help and bond with Jackson. I could not ask for more in a partner and husband.
Please do not mistake all of this as me trying to convince you that we are the perfect couple. Just like everyone else, we have our ups and downs and struggle along the way. We have spent the past eight years working on our relationship, and it has been hard work at times. What makes us work is that we are best friends and both committed to spending the rest of our lives continuing to try and figure out how to keep our little family together. Colin has always been amazing, but this experience has changed our relationship in a way I could have never foreseen, and I am deeply thankful for that.
When we finally got out of the hospital, Colin left work throughout the day (with his boss' permission of course!) to join me in the NICU learning how to care for our little preemie and spend time bonding through kangaroo care. He did everything in his power to encourage me and be a sounding board during a difficult time as I was spending all day in a little room with my baby. He comforted me when I was sad because I had to leave my baby every night. At home, Colin is a loving and attentive father and supportive and encouraging husband. Unfortunately, he spends most of his day at work (someone has to make some money!) but when he comes home he is always ready to help and bond with Jackson. I could not ask for more in a partner and husband.
Please do not mistake all of this as me trying to convince you that we are the perfect couple. Just like everyone else, we have our ups and downs and struggle along the way. We have spent the past eight years working on our relationship, and it has been hard work at times. What makes us work is that we are best friends and both committed to spending the rest of our lives continuing to try and figure out how to keep our little family together. Colin has always been amazing, but this experience has changed our relationship in a way I could have never foreseen, and I am deeply thankful for that.
Jackson
Our little boy came out fighting and keeps on beating the odds every day. Sure, if I had the expected ending to my pregnancy and he came out on time with no issues we would still be in awe of our perfect little man. However, the experiences we had with my health issues in the hospital and his fight to grow and thrive outside of the womb in the NICU have brought all of us closer as a family and has made us even more thankful for our healthy baby. I am overwhelmed every day with how much I love him. It is all-consuming and I cannot imagine life without him. I am grateful every day that Jackson is part of our life.
Jackson's gestation at birth
I was 32 and 3 when I was checked into the hospital and I managed to hang on to him until 33 and 1. Jackson was eight weeks further along in gestation and a couple of pounds heavier than the baby in the video (which makes a big difference). Our doctors told us that 33 weeks has a very high chance of survival, therefore I had faith that he was going to survive the ordeal. The baby in the video was in more peril than we ever knew. However, all those tubes, machines, and scary sounds you see and hear in the video were our reality in the NICU as well and it brought back strong emotions when I saw that woman hold her baby for the first time. Unfortunately for me, I was heavily medicated when I first got to hold Jackson and he also had that huge CPAP over his face and head so it was not really that bonding moment that most moms get when they first hold their baby. On the contrary, when I finally got to go down to the NICU when all the magnesium sulfate and morphine were out of my system, Jackson turned and made eye contact with me for the first time as I looked at him in his isolette. I immediately sat down and started sobbing, and knew that my emotions had finally kicked in. For the first time I felt like his mom and I desperately wanted to get him out of there. If I had fallen ill any earlier than I did, Jackson's chances of survival would not have been as great and his time in the NICU would have been considerably longer. I am eternally thankful that my body cooperated with the pregnancy as long as it did. Our situation could have been much, much worse than it was.
Jackson's health
Jackson was a "lung baby" in the NICU. Not only was he small and in desperate need of some growth and development before we could even consider taking him home, his lungs were also underdeveloped and he needed oxygen to breathe. The first thing the nurses did once it was determined I was sick and needed to stay in the birthing center on bed rest was to give me steroid shots to help expedite his lung development. Colin liked to joke that our baby would have lungs as strong as Michael Phelps because of his steroids. Ironically, the reality was quite the opposite. No matter how hard he tried, Jackson could not completely wean off the oxygen support he was receiving. His oxygen saturation levels were always dipping below 90% and setting off the alarms day in and day out. Sometimes his oxygen would get so low his heart rate would dip as well and cause the brady alarm to go off as well. I am not going to lie, it was stressful. He was feeding and growing very well, but we were actually prepared to go home with oxygen tanks for him. Jackson was not having it, and the last day we had to wean him before going home he finally started breathing on his own. Our little fighter was determined to go home a cordless baby! All of this led to concerns about his respiratory health once we left the NICU, yet he has been a completely healthy baby boy since we got home (knock on wood!). He has been the perfect picture of baby health, and we have not even quarantined him at home. Here's to a healthy baby boy!
*I dread the day he finally does get ill. Trust me, I am aware that all kids get sick at one point or another. I just plan on putting it off as long as possible!!*
Jackson's appetite
Jackson shocked the lactation nurses at St. Charles. At 34 weeks (our second week in the NICU), I started advocating for us and asked if we could start nuzzle nursing at feeding time. Instead of nuzzling around, Jackson latched right on and nursed for an hour. He instinctively found his suck, swallow, breathe reflex weeks before anyone expected him to. Jackson is an eater, and no one is going to stop him from getting his milk. I fought hard to breastfeed Jackson. I had to pump every three hours, eight times a day while he was in the NICU to build and maintain a milk supply since he could not expend the energy to nurse more than a few times a day. Nursing has been a struggle on my end involving nearly unbearable pain during and after nursing and a misdiagnosis of thrush. Fortunately, I have persevered and faithfully gone to a support group each week and finally it has been determined I probably have a rare circulatory condition called Reynaud's Syndrome. Now that I know what is wrong, I have been working to treat the symptoms and have found slight pain relief. It has been enough to get Jackson down to only one bottle at night and the rest of the time I can nurse and pump only a few times a day (yay!) to start to store up some milk for when I go back to work. Through all of this, Jackson has been willing to take his milk any way I can give it to him, whether it is bottles or nursing. He is a hungry boy and as a result he is 12 lbs. and finally on the "regular baby" growth chart. I look forward to being "grocery poor" once this kid is a teenager. When I want to complain about him eating us out of house and home, I will recall a time when his appetite got us out of the NICU and his stats on the growth chart. EAT BABY EAT!
Our amazing family
Colin and I are so fortunate to have an amazing family that comes from both sides. My parents had spent the summer in Bend and Colin's parents live here in Bend, so we had all the support we could ask for. When our lives were put on hold on August 1st, our families stepped up and helped pick up the pieces. Dogs were cared for, our house was taken care of, the nursery was completed, our lawn was mowed, and countless other tasks that would have otherwise been neglected were taken care of as we lived at St. Charles and then the Ronald McDonald House. Perhaps the most stressful part of the entire NICU process for me was how to handle the effect it had on our family. You see, people do not always consider that it is not just the parents who are affected by a premature birth and resulting NICU stay. Often times, as in our case, the grandparents have been eagerly anticipating the arrival of the baby as well. In our situation, we were having the first grandchild for my parents and Colin's mom. When things went haywire, the effect was widespread and complicated. Everyone was tiptoeing around trying to do the right thing, but it is hard to be supportive yet not overbearing. Keep in mind, I was postpartum and highly stressed, so I struggled with balancing what I needed and what everyone else needed. I tried to be as generous with Jackson as possible while he was in the NICU, but in the end I did too much and it ended up wearing me down physically and emotionally. Finally, the last week we were in there the doctor and nurses advised me to stop allowing visitors and focus on getting Jackson out of there. It worked and we went home the following Sunday. Throughout all of my craziness, both sides of our family handled every change in plan, ridiculous favor, and visitation denial with grace and generosity. We could not ask for better grandparents for Jackson, and for that I am eternally grateful.
I feel like I could go on for days talking about all the things I have to be grateful for, so I will cut the rambling off here. However, I do have some honorable mentions I must list:
Munchkin
Our amazing family
Colin and I are so fortunate to have an amazing family that comes from both sides. My parents had spent the summer in Bend and Colin's parents live here in Bend, so we had all the support we could ask for. When our lives were put on hold on August 1st, our families stepped up and helped pick up the pieces. Dogs were cared for, our house was taken care of, the nursery was completed, our lawn was mowed, and countless other tasks that would have otherwise been neglected were taken care of as we lived at St. Charles and then the Ronald McDonald House. Perhaps the most stressful part of the entire NICU process for me was how to handle the effect it had on our family. You see, people do not always consider that it is not just the parents who are affected by a premature birth and resulting NICU stay. Often times, as in our case, the grandparents have been eagerly anticipating the arrival of the baby as well. In our situation, we were having the first grandchild for my parents and Colin's mom. When things went haywire, the effect was widespread and complicated. Everyone was tiptoeing around trying to do the right thing, but it is hard to be supportive yet not overbearing. Keep in mind, I was postpartum and highly stressed, so I struggled with balancing what I needed and what everyone else needed. I tried to be as generous with Jackson as possible while he was in the NICU, but in the end I did too much and it ended up wearing me down physically and emotionally. Finally, the last week we were in there the doctor and nurses advised me to stop allowing visitors and focus on getting Jackson out of there. It worked and we went home the following Sunday. Throughout all of my craziness, both sides of our family handled every change in plan, ridiculous favor, and visitation denial with grace and generosity. We could not ask for better grandparents for Jackson, and for that I am eternally grateful.
I feel like I could go on for days talking about all the things I have to be grateful for, so I will cut the rambling off here. However, I do have some honorable mentions I must list:
- Amazing aunts and uncles (Brent, Beth & Martyn, Renee & Joey, Barbara, Liz & Chuck, Gary & Linnea, Judy)
- Fantastic friends (you all know who you are!)
- Sam & Dakota
- Sam's restored digestive health
- Colin's job
- My teaching job, coworkers, and students
- Our home
- Raising Jackson in beautiful Bend
- Our health
- Jackson sleeping an average 7 hours per night
- The doctors and nurses at the Family Birthing Center and NICU at St. Charles
- Ronald McDonald House
- Health insurance & FMLA
- Family vacation
Munchkin
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