Sitting at a red light after picking up my almost 4 year old from daycare, I thought I felt a contraction. But that couldn’t be. I was only 31 weeks pregnant – they must be Braxton-Hicks contractions, like the doctor said. Anyway, my daughter’s birthday party was in a couple days, so I didn’t have time to worry about this.
We stopped at K-mart and picked up party hats, plates, etc. I waited patiently (or not so patiently) as my daughter insisted on buckling herself into her carseat. I only noticed the contractions at traffic lights.
As we were eating dinner, I was watching the clock. The contractions seemed to be about 5 minutes apart. Maybe if I lay down and rested, I thought, everything would be okay.
I lay down after dinner, but my daughter, who was supposed to be asleep, called for a drink of water. As I climbed the stairs to her room, I knew something wasn’t right.
After a few short hours of labor, my son was born at 3 1/2 pounds. He was skinny, wrinkly, and covered in fuzz. And he was beautiful. He couldn’t breathe or eat or regulate his body temperature on his own. There were some rough days over the next 5 weeks, but he got great care at St. Mary Medical Center, and 3 days before Mother’s Day I brought home my beautiful, tiny, 4 pound, 5 ounce baby boy.
We were very lucky. His stay in the NICU was only 5 weeks. Aside from a bit of delay in development and asthma in his first year or so, he grew into a healthy boy and man with no adverse effect from being born premature.
Others have a harder road. A few years ago, I met the founders of the Bennett Strong Foundation, Mary and Greg Pellegrino. I was moved by their story and their energy and passion for helping parents of micro preemies. Read their story here.
Bennett is such a sweet, loving, playful boy. I’m so glad I got to meet him and photograph him. When you look at Bennet and his parents, it’s obvious how much his parents delight in him and he in them.
The Bennett Strong Foundation raises money to support parents with babies in the NICU at CHOP. They currently are supplying journals to parents to record their journey. I’m very happy to be supporting them again this year with a donation to the silent auction at their Gala fundraiser. There are many other great items to bid on as well. You can purchase tickets here.