A Night in the "Ante-Hood"

I wanted to write real quick because I feel like this blog is not only a place to share with you what's going on in my life (if anyone cares), but also to a place for me to vent. I am going to put a disclaimer out there about this post that if you don't like reading anything "gruesome" or "sad" about healthcare..then don't read this post. But believe me..I DO have a point to make with it.

I went into work last night, not knowing what would be ahead. I guess every night that I walk into the doors of the Labor and Delivery unit, I NEVER know who/what will be there, much less what is gonna stroll up during the night. Last night was a little different though. I was assigned to work on "Antepartum" which is the high-risk OB patients. These patients are either PIH (pregnancy-induced hypertension) and have to be on certain medications that they need to be watched closely, or they are in pre-term labor or simply being observed for one reason or another. The night was going pretty well so far...pretty laid back for the most part (I LIKED it!)....until about 1:00 am. We had a patient on our unit who was barely 23 weeks and her water was broken and she was already dilated 3 cm. She still had some of her fluid (which is what protects the baby), but was already leaking some of it. Well...the rest of her water broke while we were in the room and my partner and I knew it was only a matter of time. After lots of running around and calling people/doctors/NICU..at 4:18 am that little-bitty-barely 23 week old baby was born. They rushed the tiny thing to NICU to see if there was anything they could do, but they called and said they were never able to get a heartbeat. It was so incredibly sad for me to watch all of that take place. I guess it's because I have never actually been in on a delivery like that one...where it's not all happy...where it's not the right time...where you just wonder "why is this happening?". I sat and watched as the mother and father cried, yet we still had to do our work as nurses after the delivery.

You are probably wondering "Amy, why in the WORLD would you share something like that??" Well..truth is, we often wonder why God allows certain things to happen the way He does. Some people say "If God really loved us, He wouldn't do such a thing like that!" But the truth is, although God DOES love us (so much) we live in a fallen world. But God has such bigger plans than we could EVER imagine. I remember being 5 years old and my mom got pregnant. I was SO excited! I was finally gonna have a baby brother or sister! Then I came down with the chicken pox and since my mom had never had them, she got them too. She ended up losing the baby and I thought (at the ripe age of 5) that it was MY fault. I remember crying and asking my mom was it my fault...did I make the baby go away. And she explained to me then that God has a reason for everything and maybe that baby was sick anyway and needed to go be Home with Him. How neat is that though? There are thousands of "why" and "what if" questions, but the truth is, we don't have to know them all. I am the worlds worst about wanting to know answers to everything. I feel like that's the only way to have closure sometimes. But that's where our faith steps in and tells us it's ok not to have all the answers, but trusting in God will get us through. That is so much easier said than done (believe me, I know). But I am trying, each day to live with that perspective. No, I don't know why babies have to be born early and not make it, I don't know why perfect relationships seem to crumble, I don't know why good people have to die early or go through horrible circumstances, but God sees the BIG picture and He knows why. Thank you for letting me share my story..hope it wasn't too much. We'll see what tonight brings....