Everything Happens for a Reason

I've had a lot of people say this to me over the years as we struggled to start a family.  I hated it and usually felt a need to slap them.  It's not helpful and never made me feel better, probably worse.  Please, don't say this to an infertile!  Now, I know there was a reason for the struggles we had and the loss we experienced, we were supposed to be B's parents.

Since her early arrival, I've been thinking about possible reasons for this.  Here is what I've come up with.

It was a safety issue.  During the week before she was born, I was in 2 small car accidents involving me backing into things.  One car into a mailbox and our other car into my father-in-law's pickup.  Maybe she felt like she would be safer in the nicu than riding around town with me any longer.  Or maybe she wanted to get my husband's mind away from my little driving mistakes; get me out of trouble.

My best friend happened to be visiting from another state the day she was born.  It was a last minute trip that brought her here.  So B got to meet her the night she was born.  This friend also just happened to be in the city of our embryo transfer on that day too.  It was meant to be.

I am the older sister so I should be the one to go through things the first time and tell my sister all about childbirth, breast feeding, the nicu, etc.  We've joked about how I paved the way for her now, kind of like in high school!  Of course now my sister has held those babies in for so long, she won't need all of my nicu information. not sure I'm the best example of how to handle being a nicu parent anyway.  Also,  I've maybe scared her out of breast feeding with my pumping demonstrations!

We weren't totally ready for her at home so maybe she did this so we would get our butts in gear.  It worked B, we are ready!  Except fora  few things, but I'll do that today.

This has given our dog a little time to check out her room and smell some of her things.  Maybe he will be more prepared.  Poor Benson, he's been our only baby for almost 6 years.

I think the real reason is that B thought we had waited long enough.  We've been planning and trying for a baby for over 5 years.  B just couldn't wait any longer to make us parents and wanted us to have more weeks of her in our arms.

We found out yesterday that when B comes home, she will need to be on a monitor to alert us if her heart rate drops, goes too high, or if she doesn't take breaths often enough.  This is so scary and now I'm asking what the reason is for this.  Haven't things been hard enough for us already?  I want her home, but of course it's not how I planned to bring her home.  I'll let you know when I figure out the "reason" for this.