It's About More Than Just Physical Health

As a doula, one of the things that I was taught is that giving birth is about more than just "healthy mom, healthy baby".  Of course every parent is happy that their baby is healthy and that the mom is healthy physically, but typically the saying "healthy mom, healthy baby" disregards the feeling and emotions of a mom who may be struggling with a birth that did not go the way that she had desired.  Her birth may have been traumatic physically or emotionally.  She may have wanted one birth, such as an unmedicated birth and ended up needing a cesarean and she may be struggling with that mentally and emotionally.  Yet, she may feel as though she can't bring it up because she and her baby are physically healthy and she is told that that is what really matters.

I see this a lot in the lung transplant community as well.  Someone posts something in a Facebook group that they are struggling with.  It might be medication side effects, fears of rejection and/or infection, difficult recovery, depression, anxiety, etc. and inevitably, there will be people who comment "yes I struggle with that, but I can breath!".  I think that every person in lung transplant groups value the gift of breath.  Those in these groups are either waiting for lungs, have received lungs or have cared for someone in end-stage lung disease and through the transplant process.

As Elias got sicker and every breath became more difficult, I used to pause as I walked by him sleeping on the couch to make sure that he was still breathing.  I saw his pain and his struggle and I hated the fact that even if he was ready to die, if his body wasn't ready, then his suffering would continue.

On the other side of transplant, I was initially angry that he needed new lungs at all.  The statistics haunted me and I felt like so much time had been stolen from us and our future.  Then came the long recovery, the change in life plans to ensure that I could care for our family no matter what his future held, the psychological scars, and the medication side effects such as hand tremors, horrible memory, nerve pain in his feet, sweating when eating and more.

I posted once about feeling as though the statistics were this cloud that kind of hung over my head, impacting so many of our life decisions and some people were supportive, but others of course were not so supportive, because well, at least he can breathe.

When people voice their struggles, they are oftentimes treated as though being thankful for the gift of breath and lungs means that they can't also acknowledge the difficult parts of transplant. As if those two things can't co-exist or at the very least, being able to breath should mean that the hard parts are insignificant.

Because of his donor, Elias and I have been given almost an entire extra year together.  He has been given the opportunity to spend more time with our twins than ever before and to develop relationships with them that he didn't previously have.  We can do things as a family, and this year he will not only be home for Christmas, but he will remember it, or at least he will be fully conscious (he still has a horrible memory ;) ).  He CAN breathe and that is something we are incredibly grateful for and something we will always be grateful for.  At the same time, we acknowledge the hard things that we have been through and the things that continue to be hard.  Overall life has continued to get easier and some medication side effects have lessened.  I have hope for the future that isn't always overshadowed by fear anymore.  At the same time, we continue to discuss big future plans with Elias' unpredictable future in mind so that we can prepare for that.

Yes, being physically healthy is a gift and is important. Being able to breath is something that one shouldn't take for granted.  However, that doesn't mean that we should dismiss one's struggles, fears and emotional health because those things are important too.