It's pretty crazy though. I can place myself back in the hospital room the day of her surgery in May last year. I so clearly remember the first instructions from the nurse, where I was standing in the room, the smells of the place and not knowing how to touch that little tube now attached to my 5 month old's stomach. I can see my tiny one lying on her back with the white bars around her as the nurse demonstrated how to clean the tube, change the gauze, and how to twist the tube daily. I see clearly the little table at the end of her crib, scattered with foreign medical paraphernalia that would soon become so familiar. I feel myself walking by his side and hear the doctor's voice echoing in my mind, "We don't know how long...no, there's no way to know. And when she does start eating on her own, she'll probably have the tube in for at least 6 months. That's how it is with heart babies (heart babies) (heart babies)."
When they sent us home, it was a strange thing to realize that home wasn't quite home anymore but an extension of the hospital. Annika had her own IV pole, and the weird hospital noises sounded normal the next time we visited because we lived with those beepings every day now. And there's so much more.
But here we are now. November, 2014. Annika's last g-tube feeding (hopefully ever!) happened on October 30th. The week before, her hero GI doctor proclaimed out loud that "this child doesn't need me anymore! I mean, look at her! I want all her doctors to see how amazing she looks. Can this be the same, failing little thing I first met in the hospital?" and she gave us one more week to taper her off of her g-tube feedings. I exuberantly cancelled school for the rest of the day, drove to James' work to kiss him, decorated the house with the kids and served a celebratory meal. James added to the joy by buying me a beautiful bouquet of flowers (and he scored 50,000 points).
That pole and the pump and the formula and the syringes and the medical tape have been my constant companions now for 17 months. It felt weird, in those last seven nights of working with them, to think that I would put them away and possibly never use them again. I actually found myself feeling sad. What?! Am I such a person of habit I could grieve the loss of these things I never asked for or wanted? Can I be sad about something I've been anticipating ending since day one? I admit, I was happy to have a week to wean myself off of Annika's medical supplies and my routine.
The day came, though, and I gladly packed everything into a box and slid it under the crib. I folded the IV pole up and pushed it next to her supplies. But as I worked, I remembered how casually and quickly the nurses in the hospital disposed of these plastic supplies-new ones every day. Would they laugh at me, holding onto garbage?
The whole thing made me a little introspective. What else am I holding onto? There's so much that happens in life that we never expect, and yet, each little thing-as it touches us-leaves a little mark, a little habit, a little change. Sometimes it's subtle, sometimes not. Sometimes it's physical, sometimes not. Sometimes it's good, sometimes not. But every time, our selves, our spiritual selves react to that thing as we run to God, or push Him away. And every once in a while, if we stop and look, we find that we love that thing we thought we never could and we wonder how it ever happened. How did this become a part of me?
And it's hard to let go.
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