Tyrel Baraka – From ICU to My Arms

On 15th March 2013, I woke up early, feeling all happy and had my expectations high because I knew my expected baby would come any time. I started packing my bags and my baby’s clothes anxiously waiting for the clock to tick 9 so that I would leave for the hospital. My elder son Syd could also not wait to see who his new friend would be. He kept asking “Mummy, are you going to come with the baby home today?” I smiled back and told him yes “papa” I will bring him home.

A few hours later when I sat down in the living room feeling a bit tired, I realized that the baby had not kicked since I woke up. This got me so worried as I didn’t know what to do. I called my husband to find out where he was and if he could accompany me to the hospital. Unfortunately, he could not make it on time because of the demonstrations that were happening in the city over the disputed election results. I could not wait any longer so I decided to just drive myself slowly because the distance I had to cover was not much. When I got to the hospital, the doctors checked on the position of the baby and after a few scans had me admitted to checking if he was okay. I was later booked for theatre as the results had indicated that the baby was a bit tired.

At midnight of 16th March, Baby Ty was born and was presented to us. His dad received him and confirmed that he was a healthy chubby baby boy born at 3.2 kgs. The following day I woke up early in the morning feeling nice, happy, and all smiles ready to receive my baby and start bonding with him. Unfortunately, this was not the case! I remember finding it weird that all mothers in the ward had already been given their babies, while I hadn’t. I wondered what was wrong.

I decided to go to the nurse’s room to confirm what had happened and to find out the reason why my son had not been presented to me. I was told to just wait because some babies were still at the nursery and would come as soon as the nurses were done with them. At this point my heart began to beat and my body started communicating in a manner likely to suggest that there was something different…. something wrong ….I had a weird feeling deep down in my heart.

I returned to the nurses’ office again just to confirm that they had not forgotten about me. At that point, one of the nurses decided to take me to where Baby Ty was because my patience was totally running out. She didn’t tell me what had happened or where we were going. I chose to follow her. The distance becomes longer and longer as were both quiet… So I decided to stop and demand that she tells me what was going on and explain the long walk as well. I insisted that I was not going to move until she tells me where we were going and the position of my son.

She did not utter even a word until we reached the ICU!!!!! where I found 7 people standing at the ICU door facing my direction. I lost strength and hope and I felt like my heart had sunk to the bottom of my stomach!

The one thing that was so clear in my head after adding up the delay, the silence, and the long walk was that probably my son was gone and never to be seen again…….

I broke down and started crying not knowing what to do. The thought crossed my mind of neither giving them a chance to talk nor hearing what they wanted to tell me…..I don’t know how to describe that feeling, how I felt right then.… Nobody knows. I don’t know.

My baby Ty was lying in the ICU. How and why is a story I tell to date. The nurse and the doctor who saved his life took time to tell me what exactly had happened reason why my son ended up in the ICU. Moments after his birth, he was fine and they took him to the nursery where after a few hours they discovered that he didn’t look okay. They tried the usual norm of pinching him to see whether he would cry like all the other babies do but this was not the case. It is at this point that they realized something had gone wrong.

They immediately removed him from the nursery and took him to ICU for further investigation. They spoke about something like cardiac arrest, I didn’t pick it out clearly. I also heard something about him being distressed and having swallowed stuff while in the stomach, lacking oxygen and so many other things that I honestly didn’t pay attention to because all I wanted to hear is that he was okay and would soon be out of danger. One of the nurses rubbed me on the back and told me that he was responding well and would be fine. I remember praying and asking God to let His will be done and one thing that I also declared was that if God saved the life of my child, I would serve him for as long I lived.

Baby Ty was in the ICU for a period of 2 weeks and when he came out he was fine. I thank God for this baby. He is well and since we have never been to the hospital. He has brought such joy to our lives and he makes us laugh and smile. His elder brother Syd is so proud of his younger brother and so are we. We thank God for this blessing.