The hospital chaplain does rounds in the NICU for parents who want to pray with her and have them pray over your baby. I developed a relationship with our chaplain because I was there every day while she did her rounds and we would end up chit-chatting. She is a very nice, gentle woman and was such a huge help in me keeping my faith when I was so mad at God but still needed his help.
There's one particular morning I will never forget. It was just like any other day. I arrived at the hospital, walked through the lobby, took the elevator to the third floor. I checked in at the NICU desk and they buzzed me through. I walked down the hallway as the smell of sterile hit my nose. My heart still races when I think of that smell. I turned right and stopped dead in my tracks.
Munchkin was sleeping in his isolette but the chaplain and the head nurse practitioner were sitting at his bedside. My heart stopped. They always bring in the chaplain when they need to break bad news and this particular nurse practitioner was close to us. Tears started to sting my eyes; my heart was not beating. They were going to tell me Munchkin took a turn for the worse and they're going to tell me to call the Hubs to be here. I was so scared but I forced myself to walk over there.
I took a deep breath right before they would turn around to give me "the look" and the awful news.
Amy, the NP, turned to see me and....smiled? "Oh, hey Katy. How are you this morning?" What?
"I'm fine...what's...is Munchkin okay?"
"Oh he's fine. Betty just stopped by to drop something off for you and knew you'd be here soon so she waited and we got to chatting."
Moral of the story: If you work in a NICU and just want to "chat" with a religious leader, DO IT AWAY FROM THE BEDSIDE OF THE BABY!!
We all had a good laugh after that and they felt so bad they scared me like that, but it became an inside joke with the three of us. Oh dear lord.
After that, the NICU started to become more of a normal place for me to be every day.
1 comment:
The phone call after this event was just plain fall over laughing funny. Katy didn't find the humor initially - who would. but by the time we were part way into the conversation we were both howling. A NICU mom has to keep a sense of humor.
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