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The hardest part of being a parent...

I can't even pretend to know or even understand half of the things I will go through as a parent. I have only been a mom for a whole 20 months (I say 20 months not because the girls are 20 months old, but because I truly believe I became a mom the day I started growing these beautiful babies in my tummy), that's only around 608 days of being a Mamma. I can hardly say I have seen or experienced it all, and you may think I am not 'qualified' enough to make this statement, but I say this with not a single doubt in my mind and heart, that the hardest part of being a mom, being a parent, is that you can't protect your children from anything or everything that could hurt them.


I think that's one of the reasons I found so much comfort in being pregnant. Even though I knew you can't protect them from everything just because they in your tummy, but I felt like I had a little more control of just how much I could actually protect them. The night I had the girls, I remember sitting with them on either side of me on the hospital bed and just saying to them, "I wish mamma could keep you in her tummy forever just to protect you both."


Only a few hours old.

As you know when Gisela was only 10 weeks old she got a really bad bacterial infection that landed her in hospital for 5 days. It was such a hard time for me as a new mom and also left me completely torn being with my one 10-week old in hospital and having to leave my other 10-week old little baby at home. But not even that prepared me for this.


On Sunday last week, Gisela starting getting a bit flu-ey. The usual, nothing too serious, the little sneeze here and there or a little cough in the morning, a small little fever nothing I haven't managed before. Monday the poor little thing was not well and was getting fevers all the time and I could just see she was only getting worse and didn't want it to get bad and then go to Alaia and then yea you know the rest of that.


So Monday morning I call my Paediatrician and book and appointment to take Gisela. Alaia was still 100%, still in such a good mood, no fevers and looking just like her cute little self.

Tuesday early hours of the morning Alaia also had a temp and although my efforts to be on top of it, both my little babies were now sick. It's inevitable they are so intertwined in everything they do, it's impossible for them not to catch it from each other I guess.


Sunday and Monday's nights were already rough, Gisela would only sleep upright on my chest which didn't allow for me to have much sleep (but knowing that I was giving her some of that relieve was all I needed). Tuesday morning the girls were looking worse and not better and I could hear in Gisela's cough her chest was not sounding nice. So despite the constant battle in my head to not be that 'neurotic' mom, I called the Paediatrician again and now said I am bringing both of them in just in case.


We get to the rooms and shame they both weren't well. Alaia's fever at this stage had still not subsided and poor little Gisela's eyes are all puffy and red and watering. Dr has a good look at both of them and says Gisela is at the start of bronchitis and Alaia the very start of croup.

(Is it just me, and clearly it is, but I seriously thought croup was something that only happened ages ago. I have yet to meet anyone that their children or child has gotten croup recently.)


He gave us some meds and off we went. I mean, the girls have been sick before I can handle this. On the way home they both miserable in the car but eventually drift off to sleep. By the time we almost halfway home, I started to notice Alaia's breathing got so heavy and laboured. At first, I wanted us to go back to the Dr but we had literally just left there and I started thinking I was completely losing my mind and being neurotic. So we assumed maybe her position in the car chair was causing that, maybe from the crying at the Dr, I mean maybe it was also just a symptom of croup.


The breathing got worse and worse and my husband and I both started to get quite worried but we were anxious to just get home and get her out of her chair.

The second I got home I held her in my arms I just knew something wasn't right. The breathing got worse and worse, she wasn't really responding to much and was just so lethargic and not herself. We immediately hit panic station and had to leave Gisela with the nanny and rushed back to the paed (did I mention he is based in Parklane and we live in Benoni). I know it's bad but I didn't even put her in the car seat, we chucked the car seats out the back and I just held her in my arms the whole way there.


I was on the phone with the paed whilst we were racing there and he was preparing everything for me to arrive. We found a cop car in front of us, and my husband basically drove him off the side of the road to get them to stop so he could ask them to open the road for us to get there quicker.

This was the most terrifying experience of my whole life, I just held her in my arms and kept on saying, "Baby, just breathe, just breathe my baby, mamma's here." Once we started getting closer her breathing was worse than it had been and at some point, I couldn't even tell straight away if she was breathing. This is when I started crying and just kept on saying how sorry I was that I didn't turn back sooner.


The only thing I could think this entire time, was Lord, please don't let me little baby girl die in my arms.


As we arrive at the hospital my Paed is waiting in the ward for me and had already called the ENT surgeon in case...

In case what? ENT? Surgeon? What is going on?

Apparently when croup is this severe and the tightening of their airways gets worse, the child begins to lose oxygen and not breathe properly, the risk is sometimes so high that they need to do a tracheotomy. You have to be joking right? I just kept on saying to the surgeon please please just don't cut her unless you really have to.


They assessed her, her oxygen levels were very low and so was her heart rate due to the laboured breathing and blocked airways. The surgeon then tried adrenaline through the nebuliser. I don't think at the time I even registered what was happening because there was just so much going on. The paed insisted that the nurses allow me to give her the nebuliser and oxygen because she was so scared now screaming and crying hysterically and the hardest part of croup, the more you cry the tighter and more blocked your airways get. To try to reduce this the Dr knew she was somewhat more at ease with me. It didn't feel like this at the time, I just felt like I was holding my poor baby girl down while trying to force her to take the medication.


I didn't comprehend at the time how the adrenaline would impact her poor heart rate and how she felt. Her heart rate now was over 190. I managed to hold her down and somewhat calm her enough to take the full dose, and then they needed to give her a drip and needed me to leave while they called 2 more nurses to assist.

The surgeon looked at me and said to me that he really thought it would be best for me to rather step out the room because I wasn't able to assist and watching would just make me naturally want to protect her more. So they made me leave the room, and 4 nurses and the surgeon had to hold her down to get some blood and insert the drip.


I paced outside the room door and just sobbed. All I wanted to do was break the door down, pick up my baby and run away with her and take all that bad away, so she wouldn't have to go through this. After what felt like hours they finally opened the door and my poor little Alaia was so exhausted from fighting and crying she just lay there. I immediately picked her up and held her in my arms and now needed to give her more meds through the nebuliser again. She cried hysterically kicking and screaming and I had to hold her tight and just push through to make sure she could get all the meds.


Between being connected to the oxygen, having the adrenaline pumping through her tiny body and all the other meds going through her drip, my poor little baby was so wired but at the same time completely and utterly exhausted. She would only fall asleep on my chest but the problem she would fall asleep for 10-15 minutes and then wake up gasping for air screaming. It was by far the longest evening of my whole life. I have never felt more helpless and scared. There was nothing I could do to soothe her long enough that she could have some rest.


I'm not one to share pictures like this, but I think its also important for us as moms to not be afraid to show us vulnerable. This picture still breaks my heart.

Once they removed her off the oxygen she settled a lot without having that awful air being blown up her nose. She still had all that other medication that just unsettles them so much and couldn't get any rest which was all her little body needed.


The second night, at about 11:30 pm, the nurses called the paed because her breathing was sounding terrible again. My incredible paed arrived shortly after, but by then I had managed to get her to sleep on my chest and her breathing was getting better and better and she was settling more and more. The paed refused to leave and called another Dr, a Pulmonologist for an opinion as her oxygen before she had settled had gone quite low again. On the phone the Pulmonologist suggested to give her more adrenaline, which I interrupted with, "she is only 11 months old". He was less than pleased to hear me voicing my opinion in the background and my paed suggested it best for him to come and evaluate her before they gave anything else. He arrived shortly after midnight and after discussing with me how I had felt that when she was calm her breathing settle the minute she wasn't anxious or bothered - they both agreed to remove all the meds and not allow any more nurses to treat her and only allow me to give any oral meds and see how she reacted.


The silver lining or light when you need it most, is when their little smiles come back and their personalities start shining through again.

I think it was really at this stage, I realised more so than ever before, as a mother you always have to trust your gut. No one knows your baby more than you. But the biggest lesson, you have to believe this wholeheartedly and you have to live this time and time again. That's exactly what I did, I didn't just allow them to do anything without first giving my opinion and 99% of the time the nurses and Dr's agreed with my thought process. I know this isn't a copy-paste philosophy - you have to also trust your Dr's and I do. But I also believed that all she needed after all that medication was to just rest and get all the benefit from the meds and she wasn't going to be able to do that otherwise.


The other very heartbreaking part for me was leaving the other half of my heart; Gisela at home with the nanny, my mom and husband. Not that she wasn't in the best hands, because she was but when you not well you want your mamma and now I couldn't be there for her. My heart was breaking that I wasn't able to be with both of them. But I knew Alaia needed me more.


After 4 long days, we got to go home and I got to be with both my little babies again. Since being back home Gisela will not let me leave her sight for a single second, which completely breaks my heart because this shows just how much they actually do feel and know. Alaia also still wants me because of everything she and I have been through which makes things a little tricky but we finding our way again. The girls are both still not 100%, as with any chesty flu's these take some time to pass and we are just making sure we do everything we can to get them better as soon as we can.


I sit here today (now also sick with flu) completely exhausted, emotionally, physically and mentally, and I know that the hardest part of being a mom, being a parent is by far not being able to protect my babies from anything that can make them sad, hurt, sick, anxious or anything like that.


I know this is something I will never be able to really ever do, but wow am I going to try and I am going to make sure that in the times I can't - they will know just how much mamma loves them and cares for them and how mamma will do whatever she can to make them feel safe and loved and cared for always.


To all the mammas and parents, who like me, never feel like they doing enough, or doing too much, or doing anything right, you are amazing, you are everything your little baba needs in you. So just keep doing you and believe in you and that divine gift called a mammas intuition.


xx


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