new arrival

having a life inside of you for nine months is a beautiful, unexplainable gift. you begin to live for something other than yourself. you find that something ancient awakens in your soul. love in it's most unadulterated form springs forth from your being with luminescent purity so surreal that you wonder if you are suspended in some sort of a dream. motherhood is blissful, despite the physical demands a new life brings; overlooking the hormonal tidal waves you and those around you must endure. the wonder of motherhood can in no way prepare you, however, for unforeseen complications that may arise with your precious new arrival. before now we were completely unaware of the harrowing hardships that many struggle to face when their child is born in a less than perfect way. having the person so neatly united with you swept away is unimaginable. even though you know that the life of your child depends on the intensive care they are receiving, the ache, the hollowness does not dull in the absence of their presence, even if for their own good. it leaves you wondering if your perfect dream was only the beginning of a bitter nightmare with no end. reality fades into obscurity. you hope for the best whilst swallowing your biggest fears. so it is to have a birth with complications. you console yourself with the fact that somebody else has it worse than you do, but you can never deny the physical evidence that this less than blissful event is taking it's toll on your life. you try to carry on. keep it together. put one foot in front of the other. to survive. survival is the best you can do. you anxiously wait for reports that assure you of nothing. you plead inside yourself for any glint of good news. two things you may not have even known you have emerge as heroic figures that guide your day. faith and hope stand guard at the post of your failing heart. without them you would expire. they may be all that is keeping you alive.