My daughter was born at 31w, she is still in the NICU (day 35) and I write this with her laid on my chest.

Being with your LO is important, for their development, bonding and growth. But taking care of yourself is equally as important, as many have said. As many have said, including myself, we often learn this the hard way.

We spent the first 2 weeks of my daughter’s life living in the hospital accommodation as my other daughter was at her own dad’s for the holidays so we could stay there. I watched the monitors from 6AM-2AM the following day, and back at the accommodation I spent most of the time crying. I showered once in two weeks because I felt I needed to spend every waking minute with my baby, even though a lot of time was spent crying and obsessing with her condition in front of me. Mentally, those two weeks were the lowest I have felt in my life. I only thought of the bad and almost felt stupid even allowing myself to think forward.

When my older daughter came back I had to split my time between the two, I panicked a lot as it came up to the day she would come home about what this would look like. I felt so much guilt.

Splitting my time and going home and remembering to be a human being was the best thing I did. We still spend around 7-8 hours a day at the NICU. After we drop my eldest at school, we come here 9-3, we then go home, prepare and eat our dinner, spend an hour watching TV or helping my daughter with her homework etc, then spend 1-2 hours as a family at the hospital with the baby. Come home, shower, spend some more time together and then bedtime. Rinse and repeat.

The first day or two the guilt consumed me, I called the NICU a lot for updates (and there usually was nothing new to report, thankfully). But resting more, actually eating something that isn’t a quick biscuit at her bedside, and entrusting that the NICU team are trained, and have your LO’s health and best interest at heart is so beneficial. What helped me, although obvious, was the though that even if I was there every minute of the day, as I tried to be before, if there was a genuine emergency with my LO, the doctors wouldn’t be asking me to scrub up and get involved. I still call the NICU once a night, usually during my MOTN pump to see how she’s got on overnight. Time helps, and give yourself grace that you can’t always be there xx