12.3.2011 10 a.m.
"You think that true love is the only thing that can crush your heart; that will take your life and light it up or destroy it. Then you become a mother." -Meridith from Grey's Anatomy.
When I learned about Megan's baby on facebook I instantly wanted to run to her. To be by her side and comfort her as a friend, and as a mother. She went in for her 33 week appt. and told the doctor she hadn't felt the baby move for a while. The ultrasound revealed that her little girl had stopped growing at 29 weeks and there was no amniotic fluid surrounding her. Hours later Piper Marie was born a little over 3lbs.
You can only imagine what it must have been like. The moment they found out , the realization they were going to have a baby that day.The firsts. The first cry, the first touch. I watched facebook like it was the news. Waiting for updates, cheering her on from behind my computer screen when I would read she made progress.
Megan and I went to the same high school and spent a lot of time together. Different paths grew us apart and it had been probably 10 years since I had seen her. I went to see her on a Saturday morning. I was waiting for her and she called me. She started laughing and told me she was going to be late, she had opened a can of paint and was stirring it and the stick broke and paint went everywhere. The past 10 years seemed like less of a gap listening to how little had changed. Her carefree happy voice lingered as I hung up the phone. I walked into the NICU and found Piper under 13. I had never seen something so small. I soaked it all in. The noises, the beeping. The crying of other babies. The purple light radiating from the incubators. The nurses shuffling back and forth.
You try to imagine ever detail and moment the family has gone through. I wanted to capture those details that will soon be forgotten by chubby thighs and belly laughs.
Here's Piper.
