Life Itself

After what felt like an endless night, we woke up relaxed. And then my brain panicked. They hadn't called from the NICU since 5.45 am. Rumi was waking ever 2-3 hours on an average. So at 9.30 am that could have only meant that they didn't get the memo from the night nurses and demand feeding was again under contention.  Thankfully mom had come back to the hospital and I felt better when Lohit offered to go to the NICU to speak to the nurses and also understand if and when they would shift us to Paediatrics so we could be with Rumi in the same room. Lohit wrote to me that he had met the Paediatrician and they were open to shifting us. However they weren't sure if they would be able to find a room. By now I had begun to question my decision to not buy a breast pump and not read up enough on this topic. So when when hospital offered to get me to meet a lactation consultant, we jumped at the opportunity. She helped me understand how to pump and also got me to do it in front of ...

For the first time in the last 24 hours, I was finally able to feel some amount of relief. Even though it hurt like hell, I joyously left my wheelchair and exchanged it for the glider in the NICU. I had been carrying around my blue blanket and with it under me, I almost felt okay. Until Rumi began to cry. And I realised that the new nurse managing him was a man! I mean, I am all for equality, but the first thought in my head - how would he be able to help me breastfeed? I am already so lost, where will we go from here? Secret #2 - Gender has zero correlation with empathy. I tried to be vulnerable. Sharing with Arjun, the male nurse, why I was so shaky. What all had happened in the last 24 hours. How my quasi medical background made it worse. How I half understood everything and felt lost anyway. At first, he seemed unmoved. Then, as I tried endlessly - perhaps for an hour or so - to get Rumi to feed, Arjun walked up to me. And he offered simple suggestions. Had I had a chance to lea...

Why am I writing all this? What is the point of saying these things aloud? For many reasons. One, to remember. So I can always go back and re-experience the first joys of motherhood. Second to heal, forgive and forget. For those moments that were traumatic - to be able to let go. Third, to inspire more sharing. Pregnancy and labour came with so much advice and so many stories - from every woman I knew. In contrast, the weeks and days and hours after the baby arrived seemed like an empty vacuum. It's almost as if all this is a well kept secret. (I am not sure if its just me that this was a secret from, but I was caught by surprise by the first few weeks of Rumi.) And so, as I dealt with all my emotions, and physical sensations, I decided to break the silence in my own tiny way. RCH was different from Peace Arch. In many, many ways. Among these was that they didn't allow our 'Doula' to stay with us at night. And in a way we thought it was okay. There was only one couch ...

I woke up to Rumi’s shrieks. No one warns you how terrible that first howling can feel. A helplessness and an extreme desire to protect can overcome you, leaving you unsettled. They were looking for a vein in the poor baby’s hands, arms, feet. Probing and poking. They didn’t explain what they were doing. And the otherwise overconfident me, felt too tiny to ask. I thought they were doing what needed doing and it wasn’t my place to ask.  (So much for all the reading and preparing I had done. When the time came to apply my learnings, it was like someone said "statue" and there I was, stuck). Since when did the healthcare system have more power over the decisions for my own child than I did? Well, to a newly born parent of only a few hours, silence seemed like the only option. Turns out they were trying to get blood for a culture test to rule out an infection. Rumi’s temperature hadn’t yet normalised. What followed was a flurry of nurses and fast paced conversations.  I don't...

The next many blog posts will chronicle my most significant journey yet - of becoming and being Rumi's mama. I considered starting a separate blog but then decided against it. While there is a lot to be said, my identity as his mom is not separate from the rest of me. In being his mama, I have become more of me. And in embracing this with the rest of me, and finding and resolving the contradictions, I have felt more myself than ever before. So I chose to put this here. Where the rest of my life and memories live.   “This is pressure, not pain.” A simple mantra I kept repeating as I went through labour. My waters broke at 3.30 am as Loi (the father to be) and I binge watched Bridgerton. I was one week overdue at this point. We had tried nearly every trick in the book to get baby out. The latest was eating a spicy labour inducing burger (yep, there is such a thing), taking a bumpy ride and eating extremely spicy daal. I had been having contractions (false/real who knows?) for we...