Noel's Anniversary

This post is a little long and early
but Noel and I will be out of town on Monday.

Monday marks Noel’s year anniversary with a trach. This may sound sad but I actually had to go back to Noel’s Carepage to find out the exact date she got her trach. At the time everything happened so fast it was just a blur. I do however, remember the first time I knew a trach would be in our near future. On January 23 early in the morning I walked out of the elevator at Children’s Hospital to a site that made me very sad. I saw a little girl who looked a lot like Noel, dark hair and all, her mom was holding her and she had tubes. She was such a little girl maybe a year old and she had all of these tubes coming out of her neck. Up until then the only experience I had with trachs was through pictures my Aunt, who worked in a NICU, had of little kids with trachs. The only thing I remembered of the pictures was something blue was always attached to the trach. So I did now what was going on with the little girl but the only thing I could think was “No, No God, not me, not Noel, please?” It was just that morning that I finally asked the doctors why they were so cautious to intubate Noel. The answer was if they had to intubate her they were afraid that they could never get the tube back out, which would mean she would end up with a trach. Seeing that little girl made me think, “I can’t do that, there’s no way, Noel is hard enough to handle now I can’t imagine being able to hold her or move her with all of those tubes.” I spent the next hour crying to Scott and he just kept re-assuring me that Noel wasn’t going to get a trach; I wanted to believe him but somehow I knew she was going to end up with one.
It was the next night at 11:30 when they had to intubate Noel, the second they said those words I knew they were really saying “Noel is ultimately going to end up with a trach.” The next few weeks we tried and failed many times at extubating Noel, all the while I knew how it would end. Instead of being in denial about the inevitable I started to get information; of course I turned straight to Aaron’s Page it’s a website all about trachs, it has tons of stories about children with trachs. The more I learned the more I realized that yes I can do this and ultimately I’m going to have to. We had lots of support before her surgery; we met two amazing kids (Faith and Milo) and their families who made the scary process so much easier.
In the year since she received her trach life has completely changed. In the beginning we thought Noel would be off the vent in no time; a year later she is still on it. While at times I would love to move her without tubes, run to the store without a vent, sleep without annoying alarms; at other times I can’t help but be so thankful she has this piece of machinery, it’s given her so much. The benefits she has received from this life-support machine far out ways the hassles and headaches it’s given me. This vent has given Noel life; something that is so precious and so miraculous. So while I would love to wish the Vent farewell I am deeply indebted to this sometimes highly-annoying piece of technology; it has taken Noel far beyond anywhere I could have imagined.