I've never seen Abby's full head and neck.
Ever.
She was taken from us immediately after her birth to the room across the hall, where they attempted to intubate her before putting a trumpet into her nose. My first glimpse of my daughter was so filled with tape and neon orange plastic that I honestly had no image of her in my mind. In fact, when I went down to the NICU for the first time, I'm ashamed to say that I didn't know which tiny baby in the incubator was mine. I peered from face to face, but none of them looked like mine. The nurse practitioner had to bring me to my baby.
Imagine how that felt, to not know who your daughter was.
After the trumpet came the trach. I could finally see a little more of her face with some of the tape gone. (She still had a feeding tube through her nose at this point, so there was some tape there.) But there has always been something there that is not really supposed to be there.
So, while I can certainly picture my daughter's face in my mind by now, I really don't know what she will look like trachless! I didn't think that this would affect me as much as it has, but as the time draws nearer where I will see my daughter without a trach, I'm realizing how excited I am to see Abby in a new way.
I'm sure she will be beautiful.
And I will be a mess. Because I will finally be able to see my daughter's entire upper body for the very first time.
10 days!!!!
Ever.
She was taken from us immediately after her birth to the room across the hall, where they attempted to intubate her before putting a trumpet into her nose. My first glimpse of my daughter was so filled with tape and neon orange plastic that I honestly had no image of her in my mind. In fact, when I went down to the NICU for the first time, I'm ashamed to say that I didn't know which tiny baby in the incubator was mine. I peered from face to face, but none of them looked like mine. The nurse practitioner had to bring me to my baby.
Imagine how that felt, to not know who your daughter was.
After the trumpet came the trach. I could finally see a little more of her face with some of the tape gone. (She still had a feeding tube through her nose at this point, so there was some tape there.) But there has always been something there that is not really supposed to be there.
So, while I can certainly picture my daughter's face in my mind by now, I really don't know what she will look like trachless! I didn't think that this would affect me as much as it has, but as the time draws nearer where I will see my daughter without a trach, I'm realizing how excited I am to see Abby in a new way.
I'm sure she will be beautiful.
And I will be a mess. Because I will finally be able to see my daughter's entire upper body for the very first time.
10 days!!!!
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