back to school...

well, school has started back. let me just say, thank you JESUS that I am done in december. why again do i keep telling people i'm going to get my masters' in a few years? am i crazy? do i really want to do this again? give it a few years...maybe then.

Bible should be interesting...i'm taking Romans and the professor is great-he told us his story last week in class, and let's just say he's been to hell and back. several times. the perfect example of the ragamuffin gospel. i'm stoked.

Community health...we'll see. lots of projects, as is custom in the LCU nursing department. i already got one thing done...gonna try to get as much done as possible early on, so i don't have to fool with it later.

Scientific inquiry...basically, intro to research. i think it will be interesting, but really...for three straight hours? maybe not so much. the professor is great, though...i have a feeling we won't EVER be staying the whole three hours. good times.

i can't believe it's almost september. the year is flying by. seems like yesterday it was january and i was in bekah's wedding and starting school. craziness. i'm kind of glad the year is almost over (relatively speaking). i feel like i have fallen so far in my spiritual walk. i want so much to be back in regular fellowship with a group of people who love me and care about every aspect of my life. i miss that. i miss it a lot. it's true what the Word says, that we were meant for fellowship. it is a hard thing to go this road we call life alone.

on a less serious note...i cut my hair! it's SO cute (well, i like it). kind of swept to the side in the front and about an inch and a half long in the back and kind of fluffed out...variation on what i had before i let my hair grow out. it feels more like me, for sure.

back to work now...much love!

glory babies

so i visited a new church last sunday, and the pastor's wife (who happened to be sitting behind me) introduced herself and we started talking. she discovered i am a NICU nurse and then told me she'd had a son in a NICU in Albuquerque several years before.

she then told me she'd been wanting to get involved somehow, to kind of "give back." she wtalked about coming in to rock/hold babies or help out any way we could. i told her some of the things our volunteers do, and the conversation ended shortly.

i leaned over to the friend i was visiting with, and she told me that this mother had not, in fact, left the hospital with her son.

ever.

my heart broke once again for the empty arms of yet another.

i never realized, until i entered this sacred world, how many lives have been touched by the tragedy of premature birth. i have been so richly blessed over the last two years to watch families grow and heal. what a privilege to be involved in the lives of their tiniest miracles. it means the world when someone thanks me for helping to heal their child. i am so thankful God has placed this particular calling on my life...

yesterday i visited the same church. afterward, i went to the visitors' center, because i didn't get an information packet last week. the pastor came up as i was talking to a few others, and introduced himself, saying he thought he remembered me. i told him i'd visited last week and met his wife. "Yeah," he said, "I think she mentioned you." "I'm the NICU nurse," I said. "Yeah," he said again, "I saw you two talking and thought you guys went way back. Then, I watched her praying over you during worship. She told me what you do. Thank you." He then told his nine year old son, "This is Amy. She works in the NICU, where Grayson was. Remember all those months when Grayson was in the hospital?"

And I was struck once again, my heart warming to see the healing that had taken place. I value those prayers so much...from the heart of a mother that has been irrevocably, everlastingly touched. She will not hold her son again in this life, but it speaks to my heart that she is healing and reaching out to bless others...that she is allowing God to use her as a testament to His grace and peace.

For Joel, Memphis, Grayson, and every other glory baby...

Glory Baby
Watermark

Glory baby
you slipped away as fast as we could say baby…baby...
You were growing, what happened dear?
You disappeared on us baby…baby...
Heaven will hold you before we do
Heaven will keep you safe
until we’re home with you…
Until we’re home with you…

CHORUS
But we miss you everyday
We miss you in every way
But we know there’s a day when we will hold you
We will hold you
You’ll kiss our tears away
When we’re home to stay
Can’t wait for the day when we will see you
We will see you
But baby let sweet Jesus hold you
‘til mom and dad can hold you…
You’ll just have heaven before we do
You’ll just have heaven before we do

Sweet little babies
it’s hard to understand it
‘cause we’re hurting
We are hurting
But there is healing
And we know we’re stronger people through the growing
And in knowing-
That all things work together for our good
And God works His purposes
just like He said He would…
Just like He said He would…

CHORUS

BRIDGE: I can’t imagine heaven’s lullabies
and what they must sound like
But I will rest in knowing
heaven is your home
And it’s all you’ll ever know…
all you’ll ever know…

there i go again...

and here it is a month later, and i'm just now updating. life is busy, as always.

i changed my first broviac dressing tonight...imagine that, I've been a NICU nurse for over a year, and just now doing that. i felt kind of stupid asking for help and having to admit it was my first time ever...it's kind of like once you've been here six months, a year, once you've become a transport team member...you sort of expect yourself to know those things.

one of the girls who joined the transport team only a few months before i did placed lines on a new baby tonight. by herself. scrubbed in, sterile drapes (without taking 10 minutes to fully think through "this first, then this, d*&^%t, am i still sterile? yes? ok...then this..."), place the lines, suture, check the chest x-ray to ensure lines are in the right place (without having to go ask)...grr. she's been checked off and all that, but it's just frustrating to not be there yet. to still know that i am totally green as far as this transport thing goes...that at this point (and i'm not downing myself) i am probably more of a burden than a help.

humbling.

speed bumps

*about a year ago*

we had been hearing about the baby all night long. he'd been born at 3:30 that afternoon and gone under oxygen. that happens sometimes-babies need a little extra help transitioning from inside mama to the great big world. after several hours, though, the baby was still having trouble. i imagine someone went to that mother's room to tell her that her arms, aching now with a very present emptiness, would be joined with an aching and fearful heart-"We're going to have to transfer your baby to the NICU."

icu? intensive care? our baby is going to die? i can imagine the fear flashing through her heart, the drop in her stomach like a roller coaster ride, her eyes and throat constricting and welling up as a flood of tears makes itself present and showers her face. her firstborn, the child she has cherished since mid-march--and something is wrong.

we get him when he's about 15 hours old. he hangs on all day and part of the night, but is just not oxygenating as well as we'd like. we have to put him on CPAP about two in the morning, approximately 24 hours after we admit him to nicu. and again, that mother is awoken from sleep-your son is not doing as well as we'd like, so he'll need a little more help.

hand in hand, she and her husband come down the hall and go a floor below where they are, to the place that they know now is not full of death but is still scary. they go to little Jack*, and the plastic tent he was tucked into is gone, replaced with a blue machine standing by his bed. a mask is attached to his little nose and tied up around his head in a cap, a long white tube sticking up from the mask, his own little rhinocerous horn. they reach for his hands, hearts aching to know what's wrong with their son but at the same time wishing only that he was better.

a nurse appears and asks what questions they have. they look at each other, bewildered, not knowing enough to know what questions to ask. she begins to explain, seeming to understand their utter loss for words. softly, simply (but not in a condescending manner) she explains each piece of equipment and its basic purpose. she gives them an idea of what to expect while their son is here, shows them a place to bring toys and put them above his bed, little sentries watching over him when they are not there.

she seems to understand their fears and tells them that being here, touching him, talking quietly to him...these are the best things for him, almost better than anything they as nurses can do. they thank her, a bit more comforted, and she disappears, leaving them alone with their world-their child-and being more reassured that this is merely a speed bump-not the brick wall they'd thought.


that's one of the things i love the most. being able to sit with parents and give them a little reassurance that this precious child of theirs has a 97% chance of walking out of here alive. explaining the odds. reassuring them over and over that they didn't do anything wrong...that there are no stupid questions...and that it's ok to ask them over and over if they don't remember.

grass in my nose, dirt in my toes...i am SHE-RA!

so it's been a while since i mowed my yard...a while enough that it was roughly the same height as me (ok, maybe an exaggeration, but it was definitely too long). so when i got home from work, i ran my rent check to my landlord's house and then came home. after lifting my manual garage door up by myself, i went out to the back and brought the mower up to the front. i then proceeded to crank it BY MYSELF ON THE FIRST TRY and then mow the whole front and back yard in about an hour. the whole time i was kind of just grinning to myself and thinking i was pretty much hot stuff.

came back in and texted a good friend, "i am SHE-RA!" (She-Ra is my Superwoman alter ego). she told me i was funny. and then, out of nowhere...God decided to remind me just how amazing He thinks i am. i had an epiphany...here's my texted realization.

God gives me my she-ra moments to remind me that i can be strong and do anything i want, just me and Him. i can be proud of myself for doing stuff as a single woman. men are nice, but i have the ability to be confident in MYSELF and not need a man to reassure me and boost my self-worth. i can do lots of things...start the lawnmower on the first try and mow the whole yard, live by myself and not be scared when i'm the only one in the house in the middle of the night and it's not on an upper floor. i am beautiful even in a messed-up ponytail with sweat and dirt streaking my face, wearing paint-stained nike shorts and a sports bra. i can be a woman and still be myself. i can wear makeup and not be using it to hide myself.

in short...I ROCK!!!

side note before i go to bed...The American President always makes me want to cry...and have someone who cares about me deeply and can't live without me. especially the scene where she walks out of his closet wearing only one of his button-downs (ok, a little risque) and says she's not scared, and then the one at the end where she comes back and runs into his arms. sigh...*melt*...

Cara*

*not her real name

It was the end of my NICU orientation and I was in Labor and Delivery for the day, orienting with the transition nurse. I remember it was around nine in the morning, and things were starting to wake up (specifically, me). We were filling out the delivery log for the c-section we'd just finished when I heard the words "prolapsed cord." Right then, it was the calm moment before the hurricane hits harbor-the Category 5 hurricane. Nurses converged on that room like bees to a hive. The doctor had checked the patient, suspected a prolapse, and had the charge nurse verify. It was so.

We ran to the OR, flipped on the warmer, and ripped open the emergency box, endotracheal tubes and laryngoscope ready for one of my fellow NICU nurses who had just arrived. We were just laying out the nursery paperwork when they wheeled Cara* into the OR. A nurse gripped the bedrails on each side of the bed, and the charge nurse was IN the bed, her gloved hand holding the baby's head off the umbilical cord and thus keeping him alive.

Cara was moved onto the OR table and the nurses strapped her arms down and then began hurriedly prepping her swollen belly and inserting a Foley catheter. At the other end of the bed, the anesthesiologist pressed an oxygen mask to her face and began pulling medications out of glass vials. I looked through the window at the back of the OR and saw the two doctors scrubbing in. As they walked into the OR, taking the sterile towels from the scrub tech to dry their hands, I reached for mom's hand.

"Cara." She looked at me, fear bright in her tear-filled eyes. "Hi, Cara. My name is Amy, and I'm a nurse. I'm going to be taking care of your son when he comes out, okay? I want you to relax and breathe." The sterile drape was tossed over the top of my head, and I ducked as the anesthesiologist pinned it up. He began pushing anesthetics into her IV. I looked up and the surgeons were finishing the sterile gowning.

My eyes darted back to Cara. "Keep breathing that oxygen, okay? You're going to go to sleep for a while, and here in a minute, you're going to have a baby. Just relax." Her eyes were heavy. The anesthesiologist gave one last push of medication, and her eyes closed. He quickly pulled off the mask, inserted a laryngoscope blade in her mouth, and slid the endotracheal tube in with one smooth motion, just as the doctor made her first cut. My warmer alarm was going off, so I turned around to silence it. When I looked back, I could see a tear sliding down Cara's cheek.

Forty-five seconds later, a beautiful baby boy was pulled kicking and screaming from his mother's womb, and he didn't stop. We quickly dried him off, watched him turn pink, and weighed and measured him. I put a warm hat on his head, an identification band on one arm and the opposite ankle, and then reached over and secured a larger bracelet with identical numbers on his mother's wrist. Then, I wrapped that precious child, whose APGAR scores were better than any infant we delivered that day, and took him to his mother.

She was not conscious, but her face was the first one that baby touched, the first cheek his lips kissed.

I readjusted his hat and blankets. It was time to meet daddy now-the man who we had left, fearful, at the Labor and Delivery nurses station as we raced into the OR with his wife. The transition nurse pushed the crib and had the nursery paperwork, and I carried the precious bundle down the short hallway from the OR back to Labor and Delivery. The door swung open, and there stood a man in a cowboy hat, denim shorts, and a button-down shirt, looking more scared than any man I had seen before or have seen since.

I smiled and said, "Daddy, someone has been anxiously waiting to meet you." I handed him his child as the tears rained down his cheeks. He laughed, held his son up, and said, "He's beautiful. Perfect. Is he ok?" We reassured him that his son and wife were just fine, and he laughed again, still crying, as he cradled his firstborn son...