Home For The Holidays

After I had Claire in September of 2002, I remember being so relieved to be away from the hospital, to be able to regain some strength and say 'goodbye' to bedrest. It was a really trying time and I found a lot of healing in the many hours I stared into the eyes of my brand new little girl after the fact. But weeks removed from the situation, my mind soon went back to the women on bedrest in the hospital. I thought of them on Thanksgiving and by the time the Christmas season was upon me, I felt a need to do something for them. After all, the holidays are a hard time to be away from your family. In lieu of some of my Christmas gifts, I asked my family to donate to the cause of these women so that I could get gift bags with bedrest goodies for them (lotion, crossword puzzles, candy, etc.). I was overwhelmed by my family's response to help these women. I called the head nurse on the high risk floor to find out how many women were there and went to gather my supplies. The next day, Damien, the kids, and I went to the hospital to deliver the gift bags. To my surprise, a lot of the women didn't want visitors and so I had to leave the bags with the head nurse. To those that allowed me to deliver the bags personally, it was an experience I will never forget.

Walking into the rooms where the women were staying was surreal. Not so long ago, I was one of these women, yet as I looked at them I felt so far removed from their situation. God gives us an amazing ability to forget certain difficult experiences once we get through them. I thought I would walk in these rooms and see the image of me lying there, but I didn't. I looked at them like I had never done a day of bedrest in my entire life! I wondered if I had looked that way to some of the women who visited me when I was there. It was nice to strike up conversations with them and hear how they were doing. I told them all about my situation and tried as best I could to instill a glimmer of hope in their hearts. I encouraged them to keep going even though they wanted to quit. I tried to let them know that the work they were doing was so important and it was going to be so worth it in the end when they held their babies in their arms. I met a lot of strong and amazing women that day, but one woman in particular left me with a feeling I don't think I will ever forget. She was a young woman who was pregnant with her first child and in pretty bad shape. She was only 21 weeks along, which is well before viability, and had such an uphill battle to fight. The look in her eyes was one of hopelessness and I struggled to find the words to comfort her. In this very moment, I realized how lucky I was. With Michael's pregnancy we were so naive to the dangers which hid around every corner. We weren't educated on prematurity and the little we knew fell between the cracks in the translation from French to English. After spending so much time in the hospital with Claire, we were educated on many of these dangers and knew what was at risk with our pregnancy and our baby. I know that young woman saw through my cheery wishes. Sometimes, there isn't enough cheer to make a situation better. She would be lucky if she would last long enough for her baby to survive and this was what separated us. I didn't know that kind of fear. She knew that I had no idea how it felt to be her and no matter what my gift bag held for her, I had never walked a day in her shoes.

I left the hospital feeling surprisingly depressed that day. Sad for so many of the women on that hospital floor who wouldn't have the great results that I had. I realized then that no matter how hard I tried to help them, to brighten their spirits, only some of them could be helped that day. I can't blame the women who didn't want to see me. During my first week in the hospital with Claire at 24 weeks, I was in no mood to see people that weren't family, let alone strangers. The trip to the hospital was a humbling experience. I am a pretty positive person and feel drawn to opportunities in which I can help other people. But on this day, I realized that sometimes people just can't be helped. Sometimes the only solution to a problem is getting through the difficult times one day at a time. But what got me through was knowing that my difficult journey was with God. And no matter how dark the days were, I knew they would get brighter.

After visiting these women, I thought about how terrible it would be if I was on bedrest during the holidays (Thanksgiving/Christmas). When we found out we were pregnant in May, I got out my calendar and looked to see when I would probably be going on bedrest. Sure enough, bedrest fell right during the holidays. However, now that I am in the middle of my bedrest, I am finding that doing bedrest during this time isn't so bad. For one, there is a lot going on which takes my mind off the monotony of bedrest. There is Christmas shopping to be done (all online this year), Christmas cards to write, good holiday TV to watch, and from my perch on the couch- I get to see my beautiful Christmas tree and decorations. I am praying that I can get through Christmas without the birth of my baby, but feel thankful to have had so much to focus on during these last 6/7 weeks. I will be 31 weeks tomorrow and thank God for blessing me with patience, strength, and peace this Christmas season. It is certainly a Christmas season I will never forget. And for the women who are in the hospital and are fighting so hard to stay pregnant, I pray that they can find peace with the difficulty of being on bedrest. I hope they recognize their selflessness and dedication to their unborn children and pray that they will be given the grace and strength to carry their pregnancies to a safe place.