glorious experience

From this vantage point, I don't want to have any more children. It's not always this glorious experience where you bring your sweet baby home and become a zombie because you can't get more than a few consecutive minutes of sleep before having to nurse or entertain baby all over again.

Being in my current circumstance having my one month old in the NICU doesn't necessarily make me better understand the experiences of families who experience miscarriage, stillbirth or other instances of newborn death. However, it does require me (I hope) to be more aware and sensitive to the less-than-positive experiences that others have had in parenthood.

Even so, I have spent much of this evening mad as hell that I'm even in this situation right now. I know it could be worse, but that doesn't necessarily make me happy about it.

I am beginning to resign myself to the likely probability that we will also be spending my favorite holiday, Christmas, in the NICU as well. Of course there continues to be the impending return to work that is hanging over my head. Again, I say, how am I supposed to focus on stressful work that I'm mildly interested in while dealing with my son's absence in the background?

On top of that, I am STILL having a VERY personal battle with thrush. Despite the plain Greek yogurt, grapefruit extract, echinacea, garlic pills, acidophilus,  and aloe vera juice it is kicking my BUTT. I am a tough cookie, but between my body falling apart with this infection and having to pump breast milk every 4 hours. I'm over it. I hate the breast pump and what it does to my body no matter how careful I am. If I'm going to have a ball and chain, at least let it be a beautiful baby.

Here is a picture of the ball and chain I have at home--The one I use at the NICU is better.

I have another doctor's appointment tomorrow morning as a follow up to my last visit two weeks ago. Hopefully she has something useful to say or describe for my misery.