Saturday, April 13, 2013

Lara's heartbreak

Lara was so excited to find out she was expecting.
A baby!
It was great news,
but Lara had problems.
And since it was her first pregnancy,
she didn't know what to look for.
And so her baby came two months early.
Two months too early.
And he was tiny.
Three pounds.
Three pounds of baby
is less than a
sack of flour,
a dumbell,
a heavy textbook,
a pair of steel-toed boots,
or what she really wanted-
a healthy baby.
And he was so, so teeny.
And he began to have problems.
Little man was in the hospital
for the first four months of his life.
For four months,
he stayed in the hospital.
For Lara,
it may as well have been
forever.
He couldn't put on weight.
He kept aspirating on bottles.
Problem after problem.
And then,
he finally got to go home!
For a little while.
He kept having to go back to the hospital
and stay for a week or two
at a time.
Lara missed so much work.
And her baby kept crying
and crying
and crying.
He was in pain
and so back to the hospital
they would go
to test him and find out what was wrong.
They still don't know.
He still goes back to the hospital.
And he has spent more time in the hospital
than out of it.And now, Lara's baby
is developmentally behind
other children his age.
He is legally blind
and cannot hold up his head
even though he is a year old.
He cannot crawl,
or sit up,
or walk,
or talk.
Lara is not sure if he ever will be able to do these things.
He is a miracle because he survived.
Lara loves him,
but spends every moment worrying about him.
He has aged her because
she worries,
worries,
worries.
And I worry
about Lara
and how's she's feeling,
handling the situation,
and if she's doing okay.
But Lara has closed herself
off from the world.
And all she says now is that
she's okay,
her baby's okay,
things are okay.
But okay is not great,
or even good.
And I worry about Lara
and her little one.
And I want to know-
what can I do to help?
And the answer is. . . .?

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