Angry About The New Lucky

When I was pregnant people would often ask me 'So what are you hoping for a boy or a girl?'

Of course I'd give the standard line 'Oh I don't mind..as long as it's healthy'

As long as it's healthy? Such a naive and generic statement that I can now reveal carried no meaning what so ever, I hoped for something I knew nothing about.

Then when when Smidge was born tiny and sick, 'good health' took on a whole new meaning as we navigated our way through the treacherous realms of Neonatal development.

There was a lot of fear and guilt attached to the positives when parenting a baby in hospital.

For example, when Smidge took a step forward with her breathing and somebody else's baby took a step back, I would be worried for them and yet slightly relieved it wasn't us. A guilty sort of lucky is what we had.... and the new guilty lucky was frail but sweet, like the flimsiest sort of sugar paper that would fall apart in your hands.

Hearing the stories of others, I couldn't help but compare their babies progress to that of my own, so many conflicting thoughts and ideas in the face of trauma, I didn't 'feel' much at all. Oh sure, I could empathise, but essentially I was balancing probabilities, trying to determine how 'well' my Smidge was, How 'lucky' we were.

We were lucky she survived the birth as she was quite sick leading up to delivery.

We were lucky that she was only ventilated for a few days and the move on to c-pap went smoothly.

We were lucky that she didn't have PDA or brain bleeds.

We were lucky that despite the episodes of NEC she never needed bowel surgery.

We were lucky that every time they resuscitated her, she came to.

We were lucky that her vision was saved through Lazar surgery and her eyes seem fine.

We were lucky to have one another.

And this past weeks' spell in hospital was fairly lucky too.

Lucky it wasn't meningitis as the doctors had suspected, Lucky that we are home now and safe for a while at least..

Lucky that at least 90 percent of the worries that I have about Smidge on a daily basis prove to amount to nothing...

But do you know what? I don't much like the new  lucky.

The new lucky is like opening your favourite box of chocolates and discovering all the best ones are missing.

The new lucky is like putting budget ketchup on an english breakfast or walking in wellies with holes in.

Basically the new lucky looks at the old lucky and is ridiculously jealous because the old lucky it gleams and shines and the new lucky knows it is nowhere near as good.

And that's why I feel angry about the new lucky.