Life is truly amazing! We never know, from one minute to the next, what life holds. Every day is a blessing.
I am about half way through a book titled “Life with Grace” about a child’s early years after a premature birth at only 24 weeks. The book, written by Jennifer Schwertfeger, Grace’s mother, describes what the family went through, mostly from the eyes of Jennifer. She lays out the fears, the medical issues and the emotional trauma of nearly losing Grace many times. She talks about how those things affected her, the weight loss, the sleepless nights, etc., and how her family endured.
Jennifer wrote the book to help others who give birth prematurely. She outlines things her family learned throughout the process in hopes that her family’s experience will help others.
Grace is now 9 years old, which is a miracle.
I found the book quite by accident while doing research about publishers and self publishers. There was an interview of Jennifer at Beaver’s Pond website that struck a cord with me. Grace’s birth story and the reason for writing the book are very much like my book about my mother, “No Time to Quit: Life in a Broken Package”. The medical issues for the infants are a little different, but the fears and hopes are the same.
The medical system has come so far since my mother was born in 1932. The small country hospital did not even have an incubator. Mom was kept alive between heating pads. Now they call babies my mother’s size micro preemies, have special isolettes for them, have newborn intensive care units, and have many types of monitoring systems to make sure their little bodies are functioning. They also have early detection practices, and knowledge about early intervention that helps children with medical, physical or mental issues to develop better and stronger. If Mom were born now, I sometimes wonder if her cerebral palsy would be less severe…
One of my co-workers when I worked at Home Depot had a preemie baby nearly the same size as my mother. Henry was born at 26 weeks, and weighed 1 pound, 6 ounces. He was in the newborn intensive care unit for a month and then in a non-emergency intensive care unit for two months. He is now a normal, healthy toddler who is adored by his parents.
My mother, along with her mother, was only kept in the hospital for a month, and then was with a woman who could care for them for a couple of weeks before they went home. Mothers are discharged from the hospital sooner now with any birth, but the preemie baby stays in the hospital much longer now than it did in 1932.
It is amazing to me how fragile and strong life is at the same time. Opposites existing in the same space and time.