Viral Diaries (10)

May 1, 2020

South Carolina

“I’m Puerto Rican! We’re a very tribal people...family is everything. This isn’t natural.”

-Hayden, expressing his frustration with the lack of contact during the quarantine

The past week has been the most hectic point of my life. The moving process has taken almost a week due to Hayden’s 10-14 hour work days and my inability to lift anything heavier than the cat. Silver is still in the NICU, and her care team has given me an estimate of another two weeks until we are able to bring her home. I try to visit her every day, partially to stay on top of the post-partum depression that has crept on me, and partially because she is going through breastmilk more quickly than I can make it, and daily deliveries are now required. The doctors have moved her from intensive care, and are working on regulating her feeding schedule. I’m excited for her to come home, but more often than not, I feel as if the pressure of the move, the lingering trauma of my labor/birthing experience, and the stress of being a broke ass new parent may just crush me. I am doing my best to keep my head above water, and am honest with the hospital staff when they ask about my mental health.

My last check-up was the first time I’d spoken with any of the medical staff regarding the ways in which I felt my labor was mishandled. It’s such a simple statement, but hearing the words “You are validated” come from my doctor’s mouth made a world of difference. She went on to make the point that not only was my experience traumatic, but the frequent trips I make to the hospital force me to relive that moment in my life. And she is right. The first time I went up to the maternity wing of the hospital, while in labor, I recalled a conversation I had with a kind stranger six years prior, while I was there visiting my late grandfather. He asked how I was, and I responded that I was okay, given the circumstances. He replied, “You’re alive, breathing, and on two feet so I’d say you’re doing pretty well.” I’ve always held that conversation dear to me, as a reminder to stay optimistic, but now, when I get into the elevator, this memory starts to stir but is usurped every time I hit the button for the sixth floor and remember where it is that I’m going. The directions for the NICU and The Family Birthplace are on the same sign, and as I walk down the long and deserted hallways, I am reminded of the not so distant past, in which I was in too much pain and on too many drugs to be able to walk the hallways myself and needed to be carted around in a wheelchair by a nurse, hospital transport, or any security guard that was available to do so.

About two weeks ago, Silver was moved into a room with another baby. The whiteboard by his crib said that his name is Ignacio, and that he weighed only two pounds. When I went to visit her the other night, I saw Ignacio’s dad standing by his baby’s bedside. We did not speak or make eye contact. A privacy curtain was pulled in between us, but as I sat holding my baby girl, I could hear Ignacio’s father whispering to his son, speaking of future plans and how much he admired his baby boy’s eyes. He fell silent for a moment, and when the nurse came into to ask how he was doing, Ignacio’s father responded with a cracked voice, and I suspected he’d been crying quietly to himself. It was a silence I knew well at this point. I would start out happy, in awe of my child and the life that I’d created, but soon gave way to melancholy and eventually despair as I reflected on how hard my baby was fighting to survive. I’d try to retain my tears so that I would avoid causing a scene and startling the nurses (or god forbid, the other NICU babies), but they would pour from my face no matter how hard I tried. Yes, I was all too familiar with the kind of silence coming from the other side of the curtain, and mentally offered my well wishes to a man whose pride I did not care to disturb. There are many things the hospital social workers and charity groups tell parents to expect while they have a child in intensive care, but an overwhelming sense of vulnerability is not one of them. He told the nurse that he had to leave because he had work in the morning. She was understanding (all the nurses are) and gave him a plan for his baby’s care. I heard him slide the yellow protective gown off of his body, tell his son “I love you”, and watched him walk from behind the curtain, not looking back whatsoever. It seems like a cold thing to do, but I suspect he knows what I know- that when it is time to leave, you must pull yourself from the baby and force yourself into the outside world. If you look back, you may never leave the cribside. And as much as a parent may want to stay, the life outside the NICU doesn’t stop just because you want it to. As I watched Ignacio’s dad leave his son, I thought of Hayden. He hasn’t gotten the chance to see our daughter since the first two days of her life. He hasn’t held her, watched her, or smelled her scent. The hospital’s coronavirus restrictions limit to only one parent a day, and he is insistent that I be the one who goes. His experience of her is limited to the pictures and videos I take for our family and friends. It is a painful way to experience a child, and I hope that when she is home, he is able to make up for lost time.

I haven’t been keeping track of the virus cases in the state anymore. There’s been too much on my mind, and wearing a mask and getting my temperature taken before I walk into a building has become routine. I don’t find the restrictions weird anymore. They’re just a normal part of life now, and that scares the living hell out of me. My mom is back home until the lab she works at opens up again. The governor is lifting mandatory stay at home orders and some non-essential businesses are opening again. I am worried for Hayden with his job at the retirement community, I am fearful of getting sick and not being able to see my baby again, and I am scared FOR my child, because she is so small and so fragile and there is only so much I can do to protect her against the will of the world.