Part 7: A Long Road Ahead

Once we had Emily's updates and finally figured out my infections (MRSA & Enterococcus located in a MASSIVE abscess at my incision site), we received treatments that were actually helping. Over the two weeks we were hospitalized, we were so blessed by family & friends. People brought us food, prayed with us, visited, and coordinated food to be delivered to my house for the kids & him. Thank goodness my youngest stepdaughter (college-aged) came in for a visit and was an amazing help picking up the kids and dropping them off and handling dinners, baths, and bedtime.

He visited twice. He was "too busy with work" and I "already had my mom there with me".

The second was true, but it didn't mean that I didn't also need my husband with me...with us. The father of this precious baby who has fought so hard her first two weeks of life wouldn't hug me when he came. When I would cry to him, he would downplay my concerns and act as though things weren't that serious.

During my second week in the hospital, my mom went to my house for a few hours to wash her clothes (since she hadn't anticipated spending weeks in the hospital). While there, she asked my stepdaughter if she knew what was going on. He hadn't told her anything. Emily is her baby sister. Nothing. Mom sat her down and began to walk her through the repeated terrifying twists & turns that had taken place. When she started explaining, he walked past them through the living room. Mom stopped him & asked if he would like to be brought up to speed on everything, and was met with a dirty look and a sneer as he stalked off. To say my mom has treated him like a son from the beginning would be a VAST UNDERSTATEMENT, but he couldn't fathom enough respect for the woman who had cared for him the last 16 years and now was keeping his wife from dying or just mentally falling apart while recovering from COVID. Ignorance is bliss, I suppose.

I've never been so scared in my life as I was during this time in the hospital. I am also so thankful for some of the providers we had while there. Emily's NICU nurses would take my phone and record videos of her and walk me through the treatments she was receiving and and updates day to day, as well as take pictures so I would have a record of her first week of life. The OB who performed my C-Section (& actually caught my other two when they were born even though she isn't my regular doctor) took the time during one day of morning rounds to ask how I was doing. I dismissed the comment initially, but she asked again and specified my mental well-being. As though she could read the thoughts in my head, she said, "You DO know you didn't cause any of this, right?" and I fell apart.

My mom was shocked - I hadn't said anything at that point, but YES - of course I blamed myself. What if I had left the house earlier instead of laboring at home? Did I risk both of our lives trying to "handle it myself" for as long as possible? I felt like I had absolutely been the reason my daughter's birth was so dramatic and traumatic. The doctor quickly reassured me that was not the case and began to walk me through the timeline of the day, explaining what was happening at the hospital while I labored at home, how my arrival time to the emergency room coincided with her completing another C-Section, how the anesthesiologist would not have been nearby, how if I had arrived earlier there would not have been two physicians available or a clean OR room. She left nothing to question and no room for my self-blame. The release and relief I felt and awe of God's hand in the timing that felt so chaotic in the moment but was so perfectly choreographed behind the scenes - there just aren't words to suffice. We discussed medication options for my depression & anxiety and came up with a plan to get me out of my darkness. At least for the moment, I was able to feel that I hadn't completely failed my baby.

After two weeks, we were finally able to start discussing going home. Emily would soon require a trip to UAB Children's Hospital to assess her cleft and begin plans to repair it. I would require another month of at-home self-administered IV medications and regular visits from home health, on top of check-ups with the infectious disease doctor. (And don't forget to pump around the clock since the baby can't latch and try to recover from being septic - just whenever you can add that to the list, k?) I remember the last night in the hospital, Emily was asleep in her bassinet and my mom had gone home for about a day and a half to care for all of her animals and have a second to breathe and process, so I set up to pump again. When I was finished, I reached back to unhook a wire and something dropped. Out of habit, I squatted down to pick it up. Well, I had barely been able to get out of bed for two weeks and quickly realized my Pure Barre quad strength was nowhere to be found. So this is how it ends, huh? A million thoughts went through my head - I'm stuck. Do I buzz the nurse station? I finally managed to get myself off the floor and I wondered how in the world I was going to care for my crew of wildlings when I literally (and mentally/emotionally, TBH) cannot pick myself up off the floor. Add to the already mile-long list of the ways in which I felt defeated. My mom & I got everything loaded up the day I was discharged, he dropped off the car seat on his way to work, and the three girls headed home. I hadn't seen my other daughter in over two weeks at this point, and I had only seen my son once (during one of the two visits and completely unannounced - no time to prepare for my son seeing me with tubes & wires & no color to my complexion while he had to wear PPE to come in the room). So grateful that my mom & stepdaughter were there to help with the chaos circus that had just come to town.

But we had a long road ahead (just based on what we knew to be true at that point).