Two weeks from Saturday, our turtles will turn one year old. ONE! One. One whole year. 12 months. 365 days. I can’t wrap my brain around it.
Over the summer I wrote a post about processing some of the trauma that comes from spending a month in the NICU. And a fellow warrior warned me that I would probably feel sad during the boys first birthday. At the time, I didn’t really get it. But now I do. Big time.
I feel so sad thinking about their first birthday. Because thinking about their birthday inevitably has me thinking about their Birth Day and that day was many things, some of them happy, many of them difficult and painful. But what it was more than anything else was an entire day (27 hours, if you want to get specific) in which I did not see, touch, hear, smell, feel, or hold my sons. And that reality, even 348 days later, is still very painful. When I think about their upcoming birthday, it just reminds me of this very painful truth that still hurts and feels raw and sore. Something that I will forever wish I could make untrue.
They were born on a Friday and so their birthday is a Saturday and we are holding their party on the actual day. It’s a smallish affair (I think…is 20 people small or big?) mostly family, some friends, at our house for lunch which will be pizza and cake. I think it will be a wonderful celebration for them and for us.
But what I really want is to bar the door, turn everyone away, and spend the entire day holding each of them all by myself.
Happy birthday, little turtles (and Mamas)! Hugs to you.
A friend of mine had identical girls who spent 68 days in the NICU. She said she was a wreck for the entire month surrounding their first birthday. but she says they celebrate the day they left the NICU and that she brings cookies to the NICU nurses on the girls’ birthday and that both make her feel better. On the plus side, they just celebrated birthday #2 in December and she said she was a little sad but it did not keep her up nights or upset her like #1.
I’m so sorry it’s still so raw for you. I hope that the sadness fades some as they continue to grow and thrive.
i can’t believe they are about to be ONE either! this is pure madness!
i hope their birthday celebration is a happy one and gives you some beautiful new memories to associate with this date. sending you a big (hug) too.
I also cant believe the turtles are going to be one!! Im sorry that the experience of the NICU has you looking at their big day with sone sadness. I pray that when that day comes, you find some happiness surrounding all the milestones they have accomplished.
I have been following along with your blog for awhile. And im so happy to have found it. It has been an inspiration to me since I became pregnant. I just had our little guy on New Year’s Eve. Thank you for.always being open and honest about motherhood.
Happy Birthday, Turtles! What a milestone!
I remember some grief around the time of my son’s first birthday about the parts of the newborn phase that didn’t go the way we’d imagined. And for me that has faded with each successive birthday.
Can you find some time for just the 4 of you during the non-party part of the weekend? Time to grieve what you didn’t have and to celebrate how far they’ve come?
wow! That went fast!!!! ONE?!?!?!
I really can’t believe it’s been almost a year. You and S did such an amazing job surviving that NICU hell. It’s so natural that you’d be reliving it now. Hug them a few extra times every day for the next two weeks to make up for not getting them to yourself all day on their birthday.
a whole year. amazing isn’t it?! i cannot imagine how it felt to be away from your boys when they are born, but i can only imagine you have held them a little tighter every day since then. enjoy their birthday! you ladies made it through the first year!
How awesome! A year already?! Wowwee!!! Happy 1st Birthday to your two little beautiful miracles! May the joy of their first birthday overshadow the sadness that lingers of those NICU days. Keep on lovin ‘em up as my Pediatrician always said!