Time Flies! Our Little Preemie is EIGHT Years Old!

I never fully understood what people meant when they told me “Enjoy them while they’re young”, “They’re only little once”, and “Time flies!”  Then I had a child and all of a sudden, I knew what others meant, and boy, were they right. Time flies!

It’s hard to believe that this time eight years ago, I was on strict hospital bed rest at Mount Sinai Hospital.  It all seems like a lifetime ago.

I remember being weepy because I was six hours away from my family and husband.  Hubby was on the Island and because he had the farm and work off the farm, he needed to be there. He was only able to be with me every other weekend. He had spent the weekend with me in my hospital room, and had to return to the Island.

Around 11 PM on November 1oth, I started getting bad stomach cramps. My back hurt, I was in discomfort and a bit of pain.  I had no idea I was going into labour! No one told me what labour felt like. How was I supposed to know? Plus, Little One was due February 3, 2009, and it was only November!

I kept texting Hubby because I wasn’t feeling well. I felt uncomfortable and it felt like I was having really bad cramps.

Hubby told me to buzz the nurse.  I buzzed the nurse, and she checked me out. Sure enough, I had started labour.

For some reason, that night, instead of driving straight home to the Island, Hubby decided to spend the night at his sister’s in Barrie.  It was a blessing in disguise that Hubby was too exhausted to drive all the way back to Manitoulin Island that night. When he got the call that I was in labour around 2AM, he turned right around and headed back to Toronto.

Little One was born on Remembrance Day of 2008 and delivered herself with no doctors in the room.  She cannon-balled her way into this world with Hubby, a nurse, and an intern there to witness.  The doctors wrote in her chart, “spontaneous birth”.

One of Little One’s NICU nurses said that she wanted me to write a book and call it Adventures of a Preemie Drama Queen.  The nurse in the room with me when Little One was born told Hubby she had been working for fifteen years and ours was the first time that she had to call a Code Pink. Eventually, she was  known as the Flying Code Pink Baby.

Time flies!

Those early days, weeks, and months seem like a lifetime ago.

It’s almost hard to believe that she spent 72 days in the NICU.  Looking at Little One now, it’s hard to imagine her requiring a C-PAP, O2, and an NG tube!  Those early days were terrifying.  I never knew what each day would bring.

So thankful for the doctors, RTs, nurses, social workers, and other staff at Mount Sinai Hospital. Big thanks also to family and friends who visited, called,  sent cards, and supported by offering words of encouragement. Thanks to all the other parents with babies in the NICU. You really have no idea  how much  you helped us keep going.

It’s now eight years later, and we’ve got a happy, healthy, sweet, kind, sensitive, feisty, spirited, determined, unique, funny, smart, generous, creative, loving, gentle, thoughtful child.  She can now read 200+ page novels, do flips on the trampoline, play the piano, read music (I’m amazed that she can actually read notes!), and tell creative, detailed stories and jokes. She helps out on the farm and in the house, and takes care of her animals.

HAPPY 8th BIRTHDAY,

Little One!

The expression “time flies” used to really annoy me.  Now I know that it’s true though.  One minute, I’m holding Little One in my arms, and the next minute, she’s eight and truly her own person.