The thought of trying again after having a NICU baby

Having gone through 98 days in the NICU with our daughter Lara, the thought of trying again for baby #2 was far from my thought processes. It was going to take some time for the mental wounds to heal from our experience, and I started to question if I could go through it all again.

I was so focused on the negative outcomes that I did not give any hope or attention to positive outcomes for months. But after a while, I knew I wanted to try again, and that I wanted our family to grow.  

After some healthy discussions with my wife - we were ready. But would our journey be the same the second time round? 

Transcript

G’day everyone, and welcome back to the Dads of the NICU Podcast. In this episode, I wanted to talk about the feelings, emotions and thoughts that ran through my mind, and the mind of my wife as we pondered trying again for a second child after our long NICU journey. 

In the months that followed the birth of Lara, and whilst I was still in the NICU, I had some pretty bad thoughts running through my mind. So much doubt, so much hate, and so much confusion. They were hard to overcome because there were so many layers to what I was thinking about, and what I was trying to process during my first time in the NICU. 

I was starting to question myself – can I get to the finish line? What if this all goes wrong?  Would I ever want to be in this position again? What are the chances of that even happening – do I want to risk it?  Should we risk it – is it all worth it?  It was not a good time to be inside my head. 

 Once we got home, and everything had settled down, and we were fumbling our way through being first time parents and trying to find a routine and trying to find our groove, I had a realisation. 

I need to reflect. I need to take stock on what had just occurred over the past 100+ days, and I need to do something about the thoughts in my head, and the doubt and worry I was imposing on myself, or it would get out of control – and that is when I started the podcast. 

Now, I am not suggesting all the dads our there go and buy microphones and set up a podcast account, but the best thing that I did was actually put pen to paper and write everything down. All of my thoughts (good and bad), how I was feeling, how it was effecting me, and essentially start telling my story back to myself. I found this so cathartic, and it actually lifted the dark clouds that had formed a all those days ago. Now- if you would like to start your own podcast power to you! Drop me a message and I will help you out! Just don’t forget me when you become famous!

Now, back to the point of the episode. I needed reflect on what had happened, and take an open mind into that reflection – to ensure that I was able to think clearly and the chat with Jess with an open mind about starting the discussions of trying again, even thought the doubt was still there to a certain degree. 

In general terms, we were so very lucky on our NICU journey. 

Our daughter Lara was one of the lucky ones – she didn’t need surgery, didn’t have any major complications, didn’t have any lingering health issues, and had fantastic development and growth once at home. The thoughts were always in the back of my mind though – have we used up all of our good luck?

If I had to find the bad in all the good, it was the chemical burn Lara received on day 2 when they swabbed her arm to clean it before trying to put in a central line for fluids. As a result of that burn, she now has a big burn mark that will leave a big permanent scar on her left arm.  The other bad thing that happened, which fortunately didn’t have any lasting effects, was the time where her cot was lowered onto her oxygen tubes cutting off her air and turning her blue until the nurses realised, and had to give her a bit of a raz to get her breathing again. 

Even though we had a fairly seamless journey – there was still the uncertainty of how long it would take for us to recover mentally from our experiences, and actually want to try for #2.

We were so caught up in keeping Lara alive at home as first time parents, that the thought of trying again was so far out of mind it was laughable whenever someone brought it up. 

The only shining light was our little Lara – the negative thoughts I would have about trying again were all washed away every time I looked into her loving eyes, and every time she hugged me back.  I knew I wanted to go again. 

My wife Jess is the mentally toughest person I have ever met.  She has faced so much adversity in her life – and each time she just flips life the bird and keeps marching on. But even this battle was one that would take time to overcome. 

We had always spoken about having 2-3 kids, but that was if everything was progressing according to plan.  Technically it was, we had one special and healthy little girl, but we knew that Jess was at a high risk of another premmy, based on her recent history. 

 As touched on in earlier episodes, it took us a while to fall pregnant with Lara, so we also knew that there was no way we could plan the best time to have a second baby, so we figured we needed to get our heads right, then our bodies right, then we would just see what happened. 

We went to a few counselling sessions together which were great. We openly talked about the trepidation we were both feeling about the risk factors of heading into round 2, but we also knew the potential benefits. 

Jess had a few additional follow up sessions – and then the time was right(ish).

We agreed that we would not “try” per say, but we would just let nature takes its course, considering how long it took with Lara.  Then as luck would have it, it was success at first attempt, and in no time, we were on our way to having a second child. 

One of the main things that I kept thinking about was that if I can take anything out of our previous experience, there isn’t much that you can control, so the worry and doubt that you put in to your own mind will only get in your way from having clear and rational thoughts. It you think of bad things, bad things will follow – if you have a positive mindset, you will go into things more openly, or as best you can. 

I was ready. We were ready. Lara, she had no idea, but let’s just say she was ready too!

I thought I was going to be excited to fall pregnant again, and that it would be the same feeling as when we found out about Lara as it took so long for us the first time round. But as the following reflection will describe, it was far from excitement. 

Fast forward to December 2020, and we had planned to take a holiday and head south from Brisbane to Sydney with Lara to show her off to a lot of people that still hadn’t seen her due to all the lockdowns and border closures. We had planned on driving the 1000kms to Sydney to see Jess’s family and my sisters family, and then drive on another 300kms to Canberra to see my parents, as well as our many of our friends as we were both from Canberra. But COVID was wreaking havoc in Australia again, and the whole of greater Sydney was in lockdown.  Which meant no family visits for Jess’ entire family and 99% of my family were achievable. 

Fortunately my parents were in Canberra at our family home, and we were able to fly there from Brisbane without issue. We ummed and arred about if for a while – and then impulse purchased flights at 11am on the 23rd December, and we were in Canberra by 5pm that day.

We had a fantastic time showing Lara around our old stomping grounds, as well as catching up with friends and family. 

It was such a special feeling for me to take Lara back to my family home, and to share a few special moments with her in the place that I hold close to my heart, and where I grew up. 

We were due to fly home on NYE, but the day before, Jess wanted to go for a walk, so we trundled down to a little playground near my parents place that had a little pond that in its day used to attract all of the families down for picnics, stone skipping and fun in the playground. It now looks very old and tired, but I could still picture myself running and riding around the clay path when I was 10. 

Lara and I were feeding the ducks some bread when Jess looked at me and just blurted out - “I’m pregnant”.

At that moment, it felt like everything stopped. The birds stopped chirping, the ducks stopped quacking, and even Lara went quiet. 

My initial and first reaction was “oh, ok.  Really?”

Jess’s response was just as exciting – “yeah, that’s what I thought too!”

There was no excitement in either of us – no fan-fare, no doves released, and no barbershop quartet singing our praises and congratulations. 

The feeling was very surreal, but not in a good way. I wasn’t excited, but I certainly wasn’t sad. It – just didn’t feel right for some reason. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it was not the same as the time we found out about Lara. 

Our walk back up the hill to my folks place was a quite journey.  We didn’t say much, and we were both still a little perplexed at the announcement. 

Once we got back to Brisbane the next day, we were back in our apartment, and in our comfort zone, but the weird feeling was still there.  

For some reason, it just didn’t feel right, and for the next few weeks, Jess knew it was going to be right, either.