High Flyer

Boarding a flight with a week-old baby was not something I had ever thought I would be doing. I also had never imagined that I would be travelling to the Royal Children’s Hospital to seek out treatment. But I was and we did. And we survived.

Getting on that plane, suitcases being loaded underneath, having no idea of how long we’d be away for, what would happen or what we were in for, was one of the scariest things I’ve done. My need for certainty was incredibly high and my anxiety levels were off the radar. It took a lot of deep breathing to remember that everything was going to be okay, that we would get through whatever was about to come our way.

The flight to Brisbane went by without a hitch. I was able to feed our girl during take-off and landing. No crying baby here. Only a mum who suddenly realised that everything she did was now on show, judged and that her most private anatomy was no longer her own. Breasts that had a mind of their own and were producing milk like there was no tomorrow to keep up with the demand of a newborn. The human body really is amazing. It always knows what to do and when to do it. We get into trouble when we overthink and overanalyse things. Sometimes you just need to let things be.

We checked in at the hospital for our appointment and were sent upstairs for an ultrasound of our girl’s hip. As we navigated our way through the corridors, I soon realised how lucky we were. It was heartbreaking to see other children who were much worse off than our little girl. We started to think that things were going to be okay. We were going to make it.

In the ultrasound room, we got chatting with the sonographer and told them about the experience we’d had in the other hospital. They kindly advised us that the bones of babies can’t be seen by xray until they are about 6 months old. WTF! I started to wonder why we had gone through what we had back there and was incredibly relieved to know that we were somewhere that knew what they were doing.

After meeting the orthopaedic doctor, he checked her out and consulted the ultrasound images. He confirmed that her right hip was dislocated. He told us that it is quite common in breech babies, female babies and first-borns. Yep, we had the hatrick! Treatment is usually a brace fitted on the body to hold the baby’s legs abducted while the ball joint grows into the hip socket for a period of 3 – 6 months. My partner and I looked at each other, bewildered at the simplicity of the treatment, yet overwhelmed with the brace the doctor had just produced from nowhere.

The brace was fitted there and then and suddenly our baby was a boxed package. Picking her up for the first time it was like picking up a robot and trying to cuddle it. It was awkward. Where was our baby! Newborn nappies no longer fit. We had to be careful about the outfits we chose for her to wear. She couldn’t wear skirts or pants or dresses. Thank goodness for wondersuits! That was it, we could go home. “Come back in a month” the doctor told us, “we’ll change the brace because she will grow”. 

Off we went back to the airport. I was exhausted, mentally, physically and emotionally. I was going through the security scanner carrying our girl and we kept setting the alarm off. Finally it dawned on me that her brace had metal in it and that’s what was setting the alarms off.

Back home that night, the wheels started to fall off. My breasts were so sore and tender from the constant feeding, my nipples had started to bleed and the ends of them were hanging on for dear life. I hadn’t heard about nipple cream and definitely hadn’t read about any of this in the pregnancy books! I sat on the edge of our bed tears streaming down my face, in so much pain, feeling helpless, that I had a crying baby depending on me for food and the one way I had of getting that to her was failing. I hadn’t brought formula, because my rules said that I was going to breast feed. I hadn’t brought a breast pump, because honestly I had no idea about them. Somehow I managed to get through the night.

The next morning, my partner had me on the doorstep of the shops as soon as they opened. We left laden with formula, nipple cream, baby bottles and a breast pump. Looking back now, I wonder why I wasn’t more prepared. Obviously I had no idea of what I could have been in for and no one ever mentioned to have these things on hand ….. just in case.

I’ve come to realise that in life it’s healthy to have more than one way to reach an outcome, more than one way to fulfil a need.  Someone wise once said to me “If you only have one way to reach an outcome, you’re screwed”. You’ve got to have options, more than one way to get to where you are going. Because sometimes you don’t know what you need until you need it.

When Instinct Kicks In

Standing, looking through the glass window watching my day-old baby being placed on the xray table, the assistant pulling her legs down to straighten them, her screaming and my partner being tasked with holding them straight was the moment I knew I was really a mother. All I wanted to do was run in there and push them out of the way, scoop up my baby and hold her in my arms. Soothe her. Protect her. Stop her cries.

Never had I felt so helpless and out of control. I wasn't allowed in the xray room, because I’d just had an emergency c-section. It was one of the most horrific experiences of my life. It was like living through a bad dream that I couldn't stop.

Soon enough the experience was over and I got my precious little bundle back. I could hold her tight and comfort her. We were sent back to the maternity ward to await the results of the xrays. And wait we did. At 9.30pm that night, I had just drifted off to sleep and a young doctor came in to tell me that the xray showed nothing about her left knee. He then proceeded to wake her up and check her out. He mumbled something about her hip not being right and left the room swiftly, with nothing else to offer.

Two days later a burly midwife came in and abruptly told me that I was to be down in xray in 10 minutes for baby to have her hip xrayed, otherwise I was spending the weekend in hospital. I was already climbing the walls and wanted out. However we couldn’t leave because the doctors couldn’t figure out what the issue was with baby’s leg.

Somehow I managed to get up and out of bed and shuffle myself along, ignoring the pain to push the crib to the lift, tears streaming down my face. I was on my own as my partner had left to get something to eat. On our way down we ran into my partner and he came with us to repeat experience at all over again. Talk about repetitive nightmares!!!

We were then sent for an ultrasound of her hip which revealed it was dislocated. At last we knew what was going on. What a relief! But it was temporary. The hospital we were in didn’t treat children this small. We were sent back up to the ward and told to put double nappies on her and wait for our next move.

Even though we had an answer, my partner and I were distraught. Would our child ever walk? Would she ever run? How did this happen? Whose fault is it? Why didn’t the young doctor send us for an ultrasound? And so began a vicious cycle of doubt and blame. It didn’t do us an ounce of good. We had to trust that the doctors knew what they were doing and would do their best to remedy the situation.

But the waiting game is the hardest of all games to play. You don’t know what comes next.  You don’t know how long you will be waiting for the answers to appear or if they even will. At some point, there’s a choice to be made about trust. Trust that everything will be okay and things will work out in the end, the way they are meant to.

Quite often when you’re in the heat of the moment, under stress with your adrenal glands in full flight, it can be difficult to focus on anything other than that moment. You get so caught up in all the emotion, you lose sight of the bigger picture. Our baby was healthy. We are not the first parents that this had happened to.

While we were waiting for our answers, we were blessed with the arrival of our midwife from antenatal classes. An angel sent from heaven. She talked to us. She listened to us. She cried with us. She got frustrated with us and went searching for answers. Finally, we had someone on our side, willing to bat for us.

And answers she got. After making several calls we were put on standby for an Angel Care flight to the Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane. Somehow we managed to get suitcases packed for us and brought to the hospital ready to go. We waited and waited and waited. It was getting later and later and didn’t look like we were going anywhere that day. Our beautiful midwife came in and told me she was going to discharge me, as nothing would happen over the weekend. We were to come back Monday and she would sort everything out for us.

Leaving the hospital with our bundle of joy was such an elating moment. What an ordeal it had been. Life had been turned upside down over the past few days. We were blessed with our beautiful girl, we just needed to get some answers and they would come in time. At least we could go home to our own home and get settled in, get used to being a family of 3.It was time to take some deep breaths, relax and savour those first precious moments together. We had an obstacle in our way, but it wasn’t stopping us from having our precious girl with us. We learned to be grateful for what we had.

Thinking about this experience now, reminds me of the saying …. “It’s not the hand you are dealt, it’s how you play the cards”. Little did I realise how big an impact this would have over the next few months.