"Not my baby I feel like we are just looking after her"
"Scared and worried if something goes wrong and I do not know what to do."
Kirsty home and it is another chapter. With oxygen regulators and pipe in the house, we must remain sure that Kirsty is okay. We adopted a sort of shift system, after a week and I was trying to do some work.
Having Kirsty at home not only like having a new baby at home, it was more like having a total stranger there and one oh so small. Total stranger is true because we had not bonded. Apart from the contact in the special cares unit, this tiny person we just did not know.
There was constant worry that we would do some thing wrong. We had a sat monitor, just in case her oxygen levels dropped and of course there is also the risk of cough's and cold's which Kirsty suffered from. She wasn't very keen on her food and it was a daily routine of trying to give her the medication she needed at the right time.
Having a premi home is just that, we had taken over from the Nurses as not only parents but as nurses as well!
Going out together was well out of the question at this stage, being winter, and having to carry Oxygen bottles is a total nightmare. Any parent will tell you carrying all the bits around normally for a child was enough let alone an oxygen bottle!
One thing we did find was that although you could claim disability allowance, you could not have a "blue badge". Forget going to town etc this was a major journey for all of us together as a family.
Bonding Process.
At the time of writing this section, Kirsty is nearly two now and considering the bonding aspect she is definitely a mummy's girl. I suppose me being at work made Lisa very close to Kirtsy, but there again, Kirsty will fall asleep on me but not Lisa!
As a whole though although Kirsty has had a lot of love, she is not a "close" toddler. Some times she will run to be picked up, and other times no. As a whole, she knows what she wants and tries to get away with everything with Mum. Dad she knows different. IT's strange, when she runs us raggid, we get fed up, but when she is ran down with a cold we wish she was running us raggid!
Feelings.
The bonding is hard, but it does get there in the end. You have been seeing this little person for some months with differing emotions from joy, love, rejection, and fear. And of course being afraid of some thing going wrong.
Kirsty was given between 0% and 10% from being a "bird that had fell out of the nest" to a small but healthy 2 year old.
They are little miracles and if you are reading this whilst waiting for a small baby to come home, life won't be easy. But as well as the worry there are times of joy, that first smile that first shuffle that first word. Those moments are all there and to be cherished.