“Some on earth may not Sing of your arrival, but The ancestors do”

My initiation into motherhood, I thought would be as I had planned—natural childbirth, candles, the labor room filled with people I care about and love. People who would have my back as I pushed my son into the world. But on August 17, 2005, I gave birth by cesarean. 9 weeks before my due date. The doctor told me that he could die if I didn’t. Death. Before the life I had dreamed of for him. Death. Before I could cover him, like morning sun, in the blanket crocheted for him by my mother. The more and more the word death kept replaying in my mind, the more I felt that death was not option. I know now that if I hadn’t taken this position of faith, maybe even denial at the seriousness of what was happening, there was a possibility that I would have loss my mind. “ Okay” I said calmly, “I need to talk with the neonatologist.” I needed to talk to someone who I thought could come and help me bulldoze the word “death” out of my mind. Help me ignore the images that words like death conjure up. I needed here to give me something to be hopeful for.“ Well we have to see how he’s doing once he’s delivered.” the Neonatologist said, as if she says this all the time. I, completely ignorant to the “premie” world and all the science surrounding it, I put my total faith in her hands. I didn’t know where else to put it at that time. Only minutes before, had the OB/GYN said “ Decreased placenta blood flow”, “growth retardation”, “he’s very small” and all I wanted the Neonatoligist to say was “ he can live.”

After the confirmation of my pregnancy, I immediately went to the bookstore to find as many books as I could on having a strong and healthy baby. With the intention of being well informed, I called up as many friends, who had children as I could and went to every website on pregnancy and birth that interested me. As a healthy and active woman prior to my pregnancy, in addition to self-education, great pre-natal care, exercise and a good diet, I was completely unprepared for a premature birth.There is no book, video, or made for TV movie that could have prepared me for what came with the territory of premature birth and after-- spinal anesthesia, people I had never met in my life seeing parts of me only reserved for the close and personal; a surgery induced infection, fever, staples, inability to move without assistance and then the neonatal intensive care unit, breast pumps, bili-lights and a list of medical terms memorized that has impressed most nurses and doctors that I have met. Outside of the very sterile and matter of fact attitude that seeps into the walls of hospitals, I had at my side--the most high, the ancestors, people who love me and will go to hell and back with me and a few “revolutionary, people first” nurses to lean on. And of course there was the little person, who I had yet to see face to face. This person, who had a much more difficult road and fight ahead of him. A fight to live.After the fear of the unknown road ahead, came the emptiness of hearing my son cry while being carried away from me. Having to fight the urge to scream because my deadened arms and legs failed me. The overwhelming desperation of having to surrender my control and my child to a staff I hadn’t known long enough to trust. There were to bd no hospital room visits. No rolling over to be greeted by Omer’s sleeping face. No swaddled bundle handed to me after the surgery. I was left paralyzed, longing and helpless.How do you wrap your mind, let alone your arms, around a two-pound, three-ounce baby? How do you hold someone that small in your hands? How do you hold the image of someone that small in your mind? I had not remembered ever seeing a picture of a baby that small, so I didn’t have a mental reference to prepare me.Upon entering Omer’s room, the first thing I saw after seeing the many nurses who cared for Omer and the other babies in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, were numbers: oxygen saturation, heart rate, pulse; hyperalysis, and tubes and wires. All numbers connected to my son; All evidence of a rise or fall on the chart of normality. Numbers that were watched religiously and in the event that anything went beyond the normal range, those numbers could stop your heart if his skipped a beat. All this before I saw him. I had to break through the rush of this new world to keep the one in my head in tact. Seeing so many machines, so many beeps and procedures attached to one person, can make you panic. So instead I looked to him.And there he laid, wrapped sacredly, like a pearl in a clam’s shell. There was a pink tint to his skin and if he didn’t have a nose on his face there would not have been much else to it. There are some people, who are intimidated by large people, but they have no idea how mind-blowing someone so small can be. When Omer opened his eyes to the sound of my voice whatever world was intact in my head broke into tiny pieces falling out of my eyes as tears. I said his name to him in hushed tones. It kind of like being face to face with something you know god gave you and you are so grateful and humbled that you can do nothing but speak softly, like prayer. And at that moment, I understood what I thought I had, but did not—that there was nothing that I would not give for this physically tiny person…for Omer… Nothing.

About The Author:

GaBrilla Ballard is mother of 12-month old Omer Suliman, wife, writer, musician and visual artist. She is currently producing her next LP, and writing short stories and essays as her son naps. Please visit her myspace music page at myspace.com