Hand to Hold's official blog
Mother’s Day during or after a baby’s stay in the neonatal intensive care unit is a milestone celebrated with joy and tears. So many emotions accompany the decision to have a child, to become a mother and to weather the storm that accompanies a baby’s hospital stay or loss. When words are not adequate to [...]
When you have a traumatic event in your life, you will feel a variety of feelings. It is no different when you have a baby in the NICU. For my wife and I, we felt the entire gamut of feelings. There was fear, anger, sadness, uncertainty, with a little bit of surprise and joy sprinkled [...]
Through my website www.babieswithnec.com, I network with parents every week. With every story submission I walk down the memories of Caitlyn passing and feel the pain of the parent writing the story. I follow up with them when I publish the story online and, in some cases, our communication continues for months. Recently, I read [...]
When we talk about the NICU, we can’t share our story without sharing the story of a little boy named Ethan. Ethan was born a day after Kylie and was 11 weeks early, while Kylie was 10 weeks early. I am the type of person that when going through certain experiences, I like to find [...]
As parents, our tendency is to protect our children and solve their problems – sometimes to a fault. Mothers, especially, have a keen sense of being able to predict what their children need, before the children know themselves, and race to provide whatever that need may be. For parents of special needs children this instinct [...]
There is no celebrating of Caitlyn’s Birthday, it is too hard. Every April I fear as it approaches. The day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute memories flood my mind. There is not a day that passes that Caitlyn’s memories aren’t with me, but in April it is at a deeper level. I [...]
When Caitlyn passed away at twelve-days-old our world shattered. Lost, alone, angry, broken and a feeling of being hollow was all I felt. My husband and I were sharing the grieving so it was unbearable to share our sadness with each other, it was so raw and too deep. I did go to therapy, once. [...]
Holidays were a rather difficult time for our family the first year. The girls were born in May so they were apart for their first; father’s day, 4th of July, daddy’s birthday, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, mommy’s birthday, Valentine’s day and St. Patrick’s day. When you look at these holidays a lot of them are tiny and we got to see them of course for all of them but for most of these, we had one child at home and one still fighting for her life in the hospital. [Read more]
I have to say the holidays come with somewhat of a sting. Even though we have a beautiful son, and a daughter on the way (due early February), the holidays have a way of sending nostalgia through your blood, reminding you of your first dream of a Christmas with your baby. Your first hopes. The [...]
Since my daughter Daphne was born three and a half years ago, I have read hundreds of stories of babies who were born too soon. They are all different, all heartbreaking and many of them share one thing: surprise. A normal pregnancy, nowhere near term, interrupted, lives changed. That is not my prematurity story. As [...]
Hand to Hold is a nonprofit 501(c)3 parent support organization and information and resources provided here do not intend to take the place of the relationship between a patient and personal physician.