This time last year....(Part Four)

This day or so last year was my breaking point and included some of the most painful hours of my life. I was finally feeling like Matt and I had come to terms with the Down Syndrome diagnosis when everything sort of crashed around us. The evening I was sent home from the hospital without my baby was a horrible experience. There is nothing to quite describe the pain I felt (physical and emotional) while being rolled out of the nursery and then hospital without my little boy. In addition to the pain, post-pregnancy hormones alone are a cruel torture. They are 3483954743 times stronger, more irrational, and just plain nuts than anything I felt during pregnancy. Yuck. 
 
That night was restless...getting up every two hours to pump and making the call to the hospital to check on Parker was exhausting. He wasn't getting any better, and I was having major issues with being away from him-- but couldn't physically stay at the hospital while recovering from a c-section. The next day, we found out Parker would need an IV in his head to get fluids to his body...which would require NICU time. We also found out about him having Klinefelter Syndrome. That last diagnosis was the last straw for me. I broke down so badly in the hospital that the doctors and nurses sent the social worker back to make sure I was okay. I had no idea what this meant for Parker, and even said aloud..."What kind of life is this baby going to have?" 

As with any traumatic event in life, part of healing is "reliving" the moments so that you can move on and heal. That day is still one that I am working myself through memory by memory.  It seems silly to feel that way when so many mommies go home without their babies, or have terrible situations to deal with, but it was traumatic for me nonetheless.

Even though we have our tough days, I am starting to see exactly what kind of life Parker has and will have. He is loved, supported, and protected by so many people. There is never going to be a day where I don't have a fleeting thought --pleading and begging God to make his life easier, but I will do everything in my power to give him every opportunity I can. 

I am so thankful that I am the one lucky enough to be Parker's Mommy. He is the most beautiful boy in the world...