What if your baby might die? What will happen to make your life change? When do priorities become different? What will it take? Come read my entry into Transformation Nation.

My husband stood in the short hallway of the sterile smelling hospital. Charlie looked my way. There I was very sick and frightened on a gurney being stitched up. Then he looked down through the plastic incubator at our 928 gram infant son with earnest. Which way should he go? Stay with the terrified and ill wife he had known for so long…. Or go with this new child who may die, that very night, in his arms?

Like an Angel, a kind nurse pulled my desperate husband’s arm and nudged him along…

”Your wife will be fine. Come and meet your new son, he needs you now.”

Hours later my mother brought into the ICU a video of our new baby boy weighing barely two pounds (would drop to 1 lbs 8 oz later). My Mom was so proud and positive. I swallowed a huge lump as I viewed the movie of my little bird like infant, every orifice crammed with intrusive instruments… crude breathing tubes in his tiny mouth, miniscule IV’s in his thigh and bellybutton. My baby's were eyes covered by a mask for light protection, a respirator rising and falling by his side, monitors all around his tiny plastic covered crib.

The nurse took off my wedding ring,

“See this ring… it would fall off your son’s shoulder or thigh, that is how tiny he is. Give him at least the 72 hours, you have to be a positive force for your baby.” Her smile was one with concern and worry, not of comfort and hope.

This was not an ordinary baby, this was my baby and I was convinced he was about to die… and over the next few years… he almost did, several times! But Sonny had a guardian angel that would always whisper to me when something was terribly wrong… often saving Sonny’s life.

Sonny’s early birth revised my priorities, my self oriented nature, my immaturity, my attitude… life with Sonny brought about a profound change in my life and the lives of others. Suddenly responsibility has meaning and is not just a burden, but a gift. Assertiveness for the welfare of loved ones becomes paramount. Throwing away old useless habits became easy. Sleep was distant, but in the end, even as parents we became adults at last.

I see my mischievous 10 year old son now; those tubes, IV’s, and monitors seem so far away. The personal growth one experiences when the life of a child becomes the most significant thing in your life is incomparable and indescribable in 500 words or less. Just ask our friends in the Ronald McDonald house, with a baby our same sex, weight, size, and same day of birth… who did die while our Sonny survived. The grief we shared was too real. It is then we learn to lean on God, after neglecting him through the mundane or even happy times of our life. There is nothing so real.

 

See 'my books' 'Our Biggest Little Hero'

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