Happy 14th Birthday Taylor!

On September 19, 1999 at 2000, Taylor was born.  She weighed 5 pounds and 15 oz, and she gave me a ton of grief.  She was born very premature, and I had already spent time in the hospital as an antepartum trying to let her incubate further.  Unfortunately, she couldn't wait to be born, and her life began as a massive struggle to live.  

I was still in recovery from the C-section when the doctor came in to tell me about my baby. I was worried.  She didn't scream when she was born.  The doctors and nurses waited with her checking her APGAR, and then everyone got hushed, and then they rushed. I didn't even get to kiss her or hold her before they took her out of the room and away from me. The doctor asked me if he could call someone to help make arrangements.  I didn't understand.  Arrangements for what? We had the nursery together as much as we could afford, I was ready to have her in regards to being a mother. What arrangements??  Then he explained: he said she had a 10% chance to make it through the night.  Her lungs were not done developing, and they weren't sure if her lungs ever would develop.

I was stunned.  I didn't have any words.  I simply said, "I want to see her."  They didn't let me.

After I was released from the recovery room, I was taken to a hospital room, and made to sleep.  No one would tell me anything about my baby.  Finally, one of my morning nurses took pity on me, and she took a Polaroid of Taylor for me and brought it to my room.  This was my first look at my beautiful little girl.  And I was stuck in a room because the doctor wasn't up making rounds yet which would allow me to have all of the tubes removed so I could walk and go see her.

Taylor was the largest baby in the NICU.  She was 19 inches long and she was a good weight for being so premature.  The baby next to her was the size of my hand. Unfortunately, I couldn't touch her for a week.  All I could do was sit next to her and talk to her.  But the nurses kept telling me that it was better for her to rest.  I was released and sent home.  Taylor stayed in the hospital.

I fought, I asked questions, I argued, I researched, and I argued some more.  It took a few months, but Taylor finally came home with me.  I was told that I should be prepared.  No one knew how much oxygen she had lost. She hadn't been able to breath on her own for 3 weeks, and then it took another 2 weeks before she wasn't laboring when she breathed.  She never took to nursing, and she hated being held.  I was a mess, but she was mine and she was coming home.  The doctors said she would be "delayed." That she would never be "normal."

Well, here were are.  Fourteen years later:

She is not "delayed" and she is every bit "normal."  She is weird, she is silly, she has a great sense of humor and sarcasm.  She works very hard to get good grades in school and she drives me insane.  Taylor is as every bit of a typical teenager as you can get.