NICU Awareness Month 2020: The Morphing and Changing of Identities

It feels weird to realize that NICU awareness month passed by and I didn’t spend much time thinking about or paying tribute to my identity as a NICU mom and a preemie mom. Our first year was so intertwined with that identity. The girls were tiny and struggling to grow appropriately. I was constantly calculating their adjusted age. I was monitoring their development so closely and frankly worrying endlessly. 

But here we are 22 months later and most of the time I forget that they had to start their earthside lives 7 weeks early. I very rarely if ever think about the 9 agonizing weeks that we spent in the NICU desperately hoping for the girls to mature out of their bradycardia and apnea. I don’t have to endure the stinging comments about how tiny they are anymore because they’ve turned into 30 pound bruisers 🤣 once they started walking, however delayed it may have felt (they started walking around 16 months), all of the worries about their developmental milestones started to fade away. At some point along the rode I realized that I didn’t need to spend all this time worrying because I found a confidence in reminding myself that my girls would learn to run and ride bikes and use forks and color just like everyone else in due time. 

And yet the emotional trauma still exists if I look closely enough. The 33 and 34 weekers I see going home after just 10 days in the NICU makes my jealousy rear its ugly head. It’s a silly waste of emotional energy because I’ve had my 33 weekers home for 88 of the 97 weeks of their lives! But that’s the nature of the trauma that you come home from the NICU with. I don’t hear phantom beeps and alarms anymore. I don’t worry about bradycardic events. I don’t stress over weight gain. But it only takes the tiniest nudge to remind me of the pain I endured feeling like I was robbed of the first 9 weeks of my babies’ lives. 

We will never get that time back but I ultimately got to bring home two babies from the NICU who were on a fantastic schedule. I was well on my way to a full recovery from my C Section. My breastmilk supply was well established and we felt super comfortable with feeding, sleeping, changing, and all other important schedules and routines that come with the newborn phase. It was a blessing and a curse. And although I’m lucky enough to get to forget the trials of their early start most of the time, like all traumas, though the sting may fade with time, there will always be a little pain in my heart. I don’t want to forget that pain. I want to honor that part of my identify and call on the strength and resilience we were forced to build as NICU parents in whatever challenges we face and know that we got through that so we can get through anything!