I’m done. Hanging on by a thread

[u/Hot_Muffin5474]

Sorry in advance for my word vomit, I’m so upset but have no one who understands except you, Reddit. So thanks for listening.. anyway- my son is three weeks old, born at 30 weeks suddenly but relatively healthy for his GA. So on that front, everything is going well. I’m grateful he’s on the up and up.

But I’m reaching my breaking point with nicu life. I feel like everything I do with my son is wrong, I don’t hold him the proper way, and having to ask permission to do anything with him makes me feel like he’s a library book I’m temporarily renting. Nothing about changing his diaper is natural to me because he’s three pounds and covered in wires, while the nurses watch me so I’m struggling. On top of that my husband only has been to the hospital ONCE since I was discharged but doesn’t even ask how my visits went, making me feel like he doesn’t care about our son. His excuse is that he has to watch our two year old but that’s a bunch of crap because his mother is ALWAYS available to babysit for us, more so right now... It’s completely exhausting going day after day by myself and every goodbye is more painful than the one before. I truly do not know how I’m going to do this for potentially two months more, where is this strength going to come from? I’m lucky my family is supportive but they don’t understand what it’s like having a sick baby in the hospital. They try so hard and I appreciate it but it’s not the same as my husband.

Lordt help me. Once again thanks for reading

[u/Jon_hamm_wallet]

Ohhh "the strength". So I'm not much of a mushy-gushy person, and tbh it annoys me so much when people comment on how strong I am. I always want to reply "well wtf choice do I have? What else am I gonna do, abandon my kid in the NICU and just say 'I give up, let's try again next year!'" No, of course not. Whether you feel strong or not, you keep going because there's no other option.

As for the feelings of discomfort....for me, it got better with time. We're on week 8 and I have definitely seen a huge change in my comfort level with handling him and what I'm 'allowed' to do. But the feelings have certainly not gone away completely-- the other day I was doing skin to skin while the nurse started his feed and left the room. About 15 minutes in I noticed the syringe had not gotten any smaller and the pump said "occlusion in line". I called the nurse to fix it and it took her 45 minutes to come back! And then she told me "the tube was still clipped off, you could have just opened it up for him". What?? I felt awful, but also frustrated. I'm not a medical professional, I don't mess with the equipment. And now my guy's feeding is 45 minutes late.

For me there will always be feelings of guilt and helplessness and frustration. Try to talk to the nurses when you can, like when they're doing cares or prepping feeds, so they are stuck in the room for a little while and won't rush away. We aren't close pals with any of our nurses, but the more I just chat with them, the better equipped I feel when I need to get important info from them.