19 days in the NICU

Owen spent 19 days in the NICU..For one week I could not hold him..The emotions I felt during this time I want to save for my precious baby boy..
One day when I am strong enough to revisit those 19 days, I will write him a letter..I will tell him of the strength he displayed beginning the very moment he was born..I will apologize to him, as I will never forgive myself for not being able to control what had happened.

What I will share with my followers is that the first time I was able to see my son, my heart broke..the first time I was able to hold him in my arms I never felt so close to God...Every minute I was able to see him in the NICU I did with pride and courage..I do not think I ever cried so many tears as I did over the last three weeks..

On Christmas Day as I left the hospital without my son, I never felt so sad, so alone..so helpless..I left behind a part of my heart and soul on Christmas Day..What saved me? My girls running into my arms hugging and kissing me...

I knew eventually everything would be O.K..

Owen...
She gazes down
through the plastic box,
unable to comprehend his
tiny body.
The monitor wires,
IV lines and
feeding tubes tangled over
the gently rising chest
expanding and contracting
in mechanical rhythm,
his mouth taped open--a gaping, silent cry
that freezes cold
her heart.

She is lost.
Sinking into the madness
of her grief, her guilt,
an apology
forever on her lips.

She lifts, so slowly, the door
to his high-tech womb,
her own aching,
for its emptiness.
His hands flutter and feet twitch,
she cannot interpret his
fetal dance,
a foreign language spoken
too soon.

She longs to touch him,
to erase this space between them-
her hand trembling,
settling down on this other-worldly
angel child,
her palm enveloping his entire
torso.

She feels
fragile skin like soft tissue paper,
his back arches up, he squirms
at her touch,
and
at the sound of her whispered voice
his eyelids slowly draw up,
dark eyes drawing her into
this mystery.

She is lost now in love,
and is forever found.
Too much Ecstasy,
too much desire to sweep him
up into her arms
and she chokes on
the grief and the love,
surrendering to the joy that he lives, he lives,
her sunflower, her son