A Young Mother's Prayer

I'm Pretty Good At Making Boys!
I remember the day she found herself holding another positive pregnancy test for the third time in under five years. Her sons were busy burying each other in a sea of Lego's in the living room. The three year old always had a knack of antagonizing the fourteen month old within seconds of her entering the bathroom. Staring at the little blue ball on the end of the stick her first thought as she dashed out to restore the peace was, "this will be my girl"! Settling the little guys down with apple juice and peanut butter crackers she found herself thinking about all things pink. "Careful", she cautioned herself silently, "if this is a boy people will think you won't be happy about it". She shared her thoughts with her husband later that evening. "Well, doesn't it make sense statistically that this child would be a girl"? she questioned him. "Mmmmm maybe", she heard him say "but not likely". "Why not likely, wouldn't you love a little girl to bounce on your knee"? she asked almost pleading. As if his agreeing with her would make it so. "Well, of course I would honey, but you have to admit I'm pretty good at making boys"! It sounded like a boast to her and she didn't like it. She really did want a girl. The boys were wearing her out and a girl would be something different to look forward to. She was up to her eyeballs in testosterone and gunky boy stuff. She longed for a little girl to mother and bond with. She had decided she was carrying a girl and that was that. The dreariness of winter finally gave way to spring and put an end to her morning sickness. It was good to be able to get the boys playing outside again. She thoroughly enjoyed the mid trimester and dreamed of her baby girl As summer set in she got more and more uncomfortable. Her last son was born in the dog days of August. This little one was due in July. She remembered how difficult the heat and humidity were on her just twenty two months ago. With great relief her labor started while she was grocery shopping with her family. By six o'clock in the evening she told her husband they better get going to the hospital. She had packed a yellow outfit just in case but she laid a pink one underneath without anyone knowing. Her first two babies were born in under seven hours of labor. She could barely conceal her excitement even as the pain intensified. As agreed upon earlier she insisted on the epidural. Her reasoning was, "who cares twenty years from now if I gave birth naturally or comfortably"? Either way, she would get her baby and didn't feel the need to be a hero.

3 Strikes Do Not Always Make An Out!
A weird thing happened along the way while receiving the epidural. Gravity took over and pulled her baby down until she could feel it's head on the mattress. "Stop", she yelled, "this baby is not waiting". "Oh God, oh God, oh God", this hurts. Her husband could hear her wailing down the hall. He had been asked to step out while she was receiving the epidural. At first he thought someone had injured a wild animal that somehow gained access to the maternity ward. In horror he saw a flurry of activity in the doorway of her labor room. Without waiting for an invitation that would most likely not come he ran in there. He stopped short at the foot of his wife's bed just as his third son entered their lives. All she could focus on was the horrendous burning pain that the lack of an episiotomy produced. She could hear some woman yelling and asking why the epidural did not work. Vaguely she was aware of a baby on her chest and people urging her to wrap him up and dry him off. "Keep him warm honey, c'mon keep your son warm" urged the nurse. She just wanted her husband to come and stand by her. He was so far away at the end of her bed. All she felt was that burning pain and it made her inch her way up the mattress away from the doctor. Crying, she felt too weak to hold onto the baby. She begged the doctor to please let her husband come and help her. The new dad had to skirt around the overcrowded labor room to make his way to her. With great relief she grabbed his arm as he wrapped it around her. He cradled their newborn son and made sure the baby was safe and dry. She was told later that she uttered the unthinkable comment that she knew it was going to be another boy all along. Although she has no memory of this in her defense it supposedly occurred while she was hemorrhaging. Later she remembered wondering why all the amniotic fluid came out after the baby. It wasn't until her husband gasped and asked the doctor if she was supposed to be bleeding like that did she realize it was blood. As they took the baby away to get her bleeding under control she tells her husband to go with their new son. "Don't leave him alone, go with him and find out where they are taking him". She was unaccustomed to having birth complications. She nervously made an attempt at humor when she asked how many sons did it take to make a baseball team. She did not feel as though she had struck out no matter how much she had wanted a girl. Once she saw her sandy haired little boy she forgot all things pink.

He Looked Like Someone Dusted Him With Powder
The new baby boy was met by quite an excited welcoming committee on his third day. Now four years old and twenty three months old the eldest brothers could barely contain themselves. They helped with their new little brother any chance they could get. The seventh day of his new life dawned hot and humid. Everybody was beginning to get cranky. The older boys started to become aware that this new baby had taken over the household. Their mother was exhausted and running out of patience. She was nursing the new baby every two and a half hours around the clock. By the evening of the seventh day the baby was not nursing well. His color did not look right. He was losing his pinkness and he had begun to look ashy. By eight o'clock that evening the baby was in her opinion not normal. No matter how much her husband tried to reassure her that he was probably just overheated she was convinced that this baby wasn't acting at all like her first babies. His cry was getting weaker not stronger. His appetite was lessening not growing. He looked like someone dusted him with powder. She loaded him into the car. As she backed out of the driveway her husband called from the window, "hey, call me when you find out everything is okay". He busied himself with getting the boys to bed. He waited for her call. There were no cellphones back then. No blackberries or text messages. He waited a long time. Neither he nor his wife thought they should call someone to watch the older boys. They were unaccustomed to having complications.

"He's One of Ours"
When a young mother returns to the hospital where she gave birth to a sick newborn people swarm. It was quite unexpected the level of activity that surrounded her baby. A nurse was overheard to say, "he's one of ours". "He's one of ours" was something that she started to hear over and over again. Within twenty minutes the pediatrician was examining the baby. The temperature was noted to be one hundred degrees. "That's not too bad right", she asked anyone that could stop moving long enough to answer. Bit by bit she was pushed to the edges of the examination room. "Yes, he's one of ours" the nurses kept saying. "No, no he's mine and you need to tell me if he's going to be alright", she thought. She could no longer get any sound past the baseball in her throat. The doctor quietly gave a list of orders and tests to be carried out and finally addressed the infants unraveling mother. "When we are presented with a sick newborn and a fever indicates sick, there is a battery of standard tests that must be performed". He explained the various types of blood work that would be done. There were certain serious illnesses that needed to be ruled out as soon as possible in order for the baby to have the best emergency care. As he spoke to her in a quiet tone she had begun to relax. Then he said, "spinal tap". The baseball in her throat worked it's way up to her brain and lodged between her ears. "I don't understand, what is a spinal tap, are you going to stick a needle in his spine"? Someone shoved a chair under her as the doctor grabbed both her arms. She sank down into the chair and stared at a small trickle of blood that was winding it's way down her leg. She couldn't even muster embarrassment. Of course she was still bleeding seven days after a difficult birth. At that moment she wished she would have accepted the one transfusion that was recommended but made optional after the birth of her son. Back then transfusions were suspect during the height of the AIDS pandemonium. The doctor turned back and attended to the baby and a nurse bustled the mom off for clean up. It turned out the mother was also regarded as, "one of theirs".

"I'm Sorry"
Tearfully she begged the doctor to let her stay with the baby throughout the tests. After a ten minute session of heart wrenching infant screaming while they drew his blood the doctor told her this was as far as he could allow her to go. There was no way she could remain present while they performed the spinal tap. It seemed barbaric to hear him say that a newborn has a limited perception of pain and that they were not going to use an anesthetic. She now harbored three baseballs. One in her head, one in her throat and one in the pit of her stomach. She left the exam room after she kissed her baby and promised him she would be back as soon as they allowed it. She was directed to a waiting area down the hall. It was crowded and noisy but still she could hear her baby scream. She found it impossible to stay seated. All she could hear was him screaming. They were hurting him and there was nothing she could do about it. She couldn't get enough air. She found herself further away from the examination room where they were sticking a needle into her baby's spine in an empty hallway. There were no chairs but thankfully she was alone there. She leaned against the wall and just sank to the floor. She didn't know how long she was curled up with her face pressed against the cold tile weeping. Whispering the same prayer over and over, "please God, don't let my baby boy die". "I want him, he didn't have to be a girl, I love him, I promise, please don't take him because I was ungrateful". She thought for sure that somehow she was being punished for being selfish and not appreciating what she had. She kept reminding God that five minutes after that baby was born she was in love with him and God knew it. While she was deep into bargaining she felt the doctor's hand on her shoulder. He lifted her to her feet and said he was sorry. Instantly recognizing the look of insanity on her face he rushed forth with an explanation. They had drawn blood rather than spinal fluid and they had to repeat the spinal tap. Quickly he apologized for making her think he was sorry because the baby was gone. He was frazzled and upset that they had to repeat the test. She noticed his eyes were filled with tears. "Okay, just do whatever you need to do to find out what is wrong with him", she offered. He led her out to the main desk and picked up a phone and handed her the receiver. "You have to call someone now". The first thing she blurted out was that she was going to call her husband when everything was alright. "It is nearly midnight and it's time for you to call him, I don't want you to be alone anymore". She made the call.

I Don't Think This Is Going To Be Okay
Her husband picked up the phone before it completed one ring. She could tell he had been crying. She told him as much as she knew at that point. He kept telling her he wanted to be there but at that hour he didn't know who to call. She reassured him to the best of her ability and kept her composure. "It's okay, we have the best doctor and he's running a lot of tests". She told him that the nurses were calling the baby theirs and she was pretty sure they were not going to let anything happen to him. She kept thinking how hard it has to be to be stuck at home and not be there where the baby was. So she stayed positive on the phone and swallowed the baseball. Her husband asked her if she thought it was going to be okay. She never told him what she was thinking. She was thinking, "I don't think this is going to be okay" not even a little bit. By this time her swollen breasts had completely drenched her shirt. It had been five hours since she had tried to nurse the baby. She found a closet and helped herself to a johnny and slipped it over her clothes. She stopped caring hours ago about what she looked like. None of that mattered. Nothing would ever matter again if she went home with no baby.

Mom, I Need You
It had to be close to one o'clock in the morning when she reached for the desk phone once again. She couldn't stop herself from dialing the numbers. She listened to the phone ring, once, twice and on the third ring her Mom's voice, "Yes". Her Mom always said yes instead of hello when she was expecting an important phone call.
There was nothing like the sound of her own mother's voice when she was trying to hold herself together. She found herself undone faster than a silk ribbon on a box of chocolates. "Mom, I need you, the baby is sick, we're at the hospital, I don't know what's wrong with him, what am I going to do if he dies". There, she had choked out the words that had been bound up inside her for hours. "I'm coming, it's going to take some time but I'm coming". "Stay there, Mom's coming okay"? "Your coming, okay" she repeated the words back to her mother like a small child does to make sure they got it right the first time. "Yes, I love you, Mom's coming" she answered.

We're Glad This Wasn't Your First Baby
Around one thirty in the morning the doctor found her in a nearly empty waiting room. She learned that the spinal fluid was clear. There was no evidence of spinal meningitis. However, they did find e-coli bacteria in the baby's blood stream. There was a systemic infection going on and they needed to isolate the cause. At that point the baby had been given two injections of powerful antibiotics. They had moved him to an in patient room. After calling her husband and relating all she could possibly understand she was reunited with her baby boy. She found him swaddled and sleeping soundly in a clear bassinet. He had a nurse standing by him waiting for his mom so he wouldn't be alone. She kissed his damp hair and felt him shudder. That shivery, whole body tremor told her he had had enough testing for one night. Not long after her mom and sister arrived. It was nearing two o'clock in the morning. They had sandwiches and ice tea. Somehow a mother instinctively knows what her baby needs no matter how old her baby is. At three o'clock in the morning the doctor came back into the room.
He was almost certain the cause of illness was kidney reflux. The baby was born with ureters that were too wide. When he wet his diaper urine would flush back up into his kidneys. The urine that flushed backwards carried bacteria. The bacteria had spilled over into his bloodstream. After reassuring the young mom that pending a dye test to confirm the diagnosis there was indeed a cure. When the baby grew to be a few months old they were able to perform ureter re-implant surgery.They had the means to remove his tiny ureters, narrow them and replace them in his body. It wasn't easy to accept that there would be a major surgery in the near future for this seven day old baby boy. The doctor put things into perspective when he told her had she waited one more day it would have been too late. He had been awfully glad this wasn't her first newborn. How a normal newborn behaves is something a new mother learns when she has one. Nearly losing a son when all she wanted was a girl taught this mother a very valuable lesson. A healthy newborn is the only kind of baby to wish for. Everyday is Mother's Day if you are blessed to have all of your children still with you.