The dreaded phone call

The phone call that every parent gets told to wait for it's the one to tell you when surgery is going ahead.  It's the only phone call in the world that can turn a reasonably balanced stable human being in to a blubbering shaking wreck in 0 to 60 seconds flat.  The call where by you spend five minute's afterwards walking round your house wondering who has stole all the air as you can't breath and wonder what your meant to do next, think god this is it, nothing is going to be the same again. You feel sick, dizzy, like your heart is going to burst out of your chest, you cry but your not sure why.  You want to grab a bag and put everything you own in it and go there and then.  Yes it is possible to have all these feelings at the same time.

And breath.

That was me on Sunday 29th January 2012 late in the afternoon after just getting in from seeing Ruaidhri. After five day's of being told that it was going to be tomorrow if felt like tomorrow wasn't coming.  Well now it was that tomorrow.  What do we do now, I had no idea what to pack or for how long for, do we take clothes for the little man.  My head was spinning.  This really was going to happen now.  There was no-one telling me now that this was a mistake.  For the first time in five day's it was very REAL. Tomorrow we would meet the man who we would have to put all our trust into, a stranger.

That night we packed enough clothes for a couple of nights, as we weren't sure if we were going to get a room at the Ronald McDonald house which is a house that parents get to stay in for free whilst their children have surgery.

The next call I had to make was to my mum to tell her what was happening and to talk to Poppy.  It had seem like such a long time since I had seen her.  All I wanted was to cuddle her and have her close to me. I know that it was best not to keep having her go back and forth and I know that she was being looked after, but I just wanted my baby girl.  

It's funny how detached you start to feel.  I knew Ruaidhri was my baby boy but with not having the first few day's with him and Lee being there to bond with him I felt like he didn't really need me. He was happy with the nurses and was settled and content.  Poppy on the other I hand I knew that she would want me. Everyone was telling me once the surgery is done you will have plenty of time to bond with him.  I wanted it now though.  I spoke to Poppy and tried hard not to cry.  She sounded happy at my mum's with my brother's there, why wouldn't she they are family after all.  So I spent the rest of the night restless and feeling very numb, it seemed neither of my children needed me at the moment.  Yes this is crazy talk but that is what my head and my heart was telling me at the time.

I felt in one more person told me it was going to be alright I would scream, what do they know, has this happened to them.  Answer was no but I suppose they tell you what they think you want to hear.  Everyone wanted to know the In's and outs and I had no answer, all I knew was that it was open heart surgery on my baby who was 5 days old and who should be at home with me right now.  If one more person that afternoon told me he was in the best place, and the Dr's know what they are doing, I was ready to shout back well he isn't in the best place because the best place is at home with me and of course the Dr's know what they are doing they work at the bloody hospital and they don't just let anyone do open heart surgery.(even just reading that now makes me cross).  But apparently you have to be nice to people as they are trying.  They are trying alright my bloody patience, and these are mainly family members, the people who claim to know me the best, so why were they not being their usual blunt straight to the point self, where were the sarcastic comments and being told I was a drama queen.  That's what I needed to hear not all the crap that was coming my way. It was like they were to scared to tell me what they really thought and how they really felt in case it upset me.  The fact was that all this tip toeing and being nice was too much and felt false.  I wanted my dysfunctional family and friends the ones who have never held back from saying what they thought.

So if they felt too scared to tell me what they thought should I be equally as sacred of what was coming???