LuCky mE!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I've spent some time this week counting my blessings and and feeling LUCKY for all I have in my life:  a fabulous husband, three great kids, a house, vehicles, clothing, food, family.  The list goes on and on.

One thing really stood out to me this week as I was able to take Carter to his neonatal follow-up appointment on Tuesday.  Neonatal follow-up is a state run program that follows the progress of preemies to help ensure they don't get left behind in their growth and development.  It's usually a really long morning of sitting and waiting our turn to see each specialist/doctor.  However, this time around, the four plus hours we spent there didn't seem all that bad.  As I sat in the waiting room watching all the kids (most right around Carter's age) play, I started thinking back to nearly three years ago when Carter was born. 

The day of Carter's birth was down-right scary. I went into shock when they told me I was going to be delivering a 24 week old baby.  All I could think about was if I had this baby and he didn't survive, I didn't want to ever have another birthday again.  (Luckily, Carter turned out to be one heck of a great birthday present.) We waited nearly two hours after his birth to find out if he had even survived.  Then, once we were told he had survived, we were told there were no guarantees; the first 72 hours or so were absolutely critical.  After that it seemed there was always something for the poor little guy to overcome; learning to breathe, fighting infections, enduring heel pokes and IVs in nearly every part of his micro-preemie body, learning to eat, the balancing act between eating enough but not expending too many calories so as to lose any weight.  As Carter approached each obstacle and then seemingly hurdled over it, I remember our nurses telling us how lucky we were.  When your child is in the NICU, the doctors and nurses (especially the nurses) are pretty straight forward with you.  They try not to kill your hope, but make it very clear just how serious your baby's situation is.  We heard more than once, sometimes from nurses with tears in their eyes,  "this just doesn't happen with a 24 weeker".  Carter beat so many odds.  He never had to have surgery, never required a NG tube for feeding, never had an infection he didn't overcome--all very rare for such an early baby. 

So, as I sat in that waiting room nearly three years later, I was simply grateful for the time to watch my baby breathe, walk, run, play with trucks, climb, and even cry!