Regrets Only: Delhi Day 91

On April 17, 2011, I wrote:

I have started this blog from the very beginning with the purpose being threefold: 1) to raise awareness of this unique family building option, 2) to serve as our children’s story so that they can understand just how desperately we wanted  them, and 3) to keep our friends and family updated on our situation...

One year, one month and fourteen days later, my purpose in writing has not changed. 

This blog was never meant to be anything other than an outlet for me to capture the highs and lows of this journey-- often raw and unfiltered-- the only way I know how.

It's difficult to explain what it's like to purchase a one way ticket to India... to leave your job, your husband, your family, everything you know... to arrive alone with no support in a foreign country... to find your babies, which you have spent four agonizingly long years trying to conceive and never had the opportunity to carry, in a NICU hooked up to every tube and monitor imaginable... to find yourself still there after three months.

But I've done the best I can.

Often, through humor.

And it has never been my intent to hurt or offend anyone in the process.

Today was, hands down, the absolute worst day of all my 91 days in Delhi, as it was sadly, brought to my attention that I may have done so. 

India is not America. And through my writing, I have not meant to imply that the latter is any greater than the former. Indeed, I have found myself many a time remarking that I have fallen in love and could see myself living here. (Although I question whether Carlos could survive the heat.)

And although it is not greater, it is different. And it is these differences in culture which have most often stood out in my mind at the end of the day, and thus, made it into many a post. 

This blog was never meant as an advertising mechanism for anyone or anything. Accordingly, there are many things that I have experienced-- both good and bad-- which have not made their way into my posts.

Because I write what I write when I am feeling it.

After today, however, it is important to me that I share the following, which though I may have failed to include on my blog thusfar, has been included in every email I've ever received from prospective parents regarding preterm babies born in India:

My babies were both transported to Delhi New Born Centre shortly after birth. If yours are too, then you should consider yourself lucky. Regardless of where in the world you are from, you will NEVER find care that matches that which your children will receive in this NICU. To all those who work there, this is not a job. Rather, it is a vocation, performed with love. Though initially, there will be inevitable difficulties in communicating across cultures, you will quickly find that such differences dissipate as you become a part of the Delhi New Born family. I choose to make the 1-2 hour trek each way to Delhi New Born (almost) every day, not for the lack of frilly hospitals steps from my hotel, but because I have the utmost trust and faith in everyone who works at this centre. I have found that trust and faith can, unfortunately, be two difficult things to come by in India. I am thankful every day that I have found them there.

On a final note, I am incredibly saddened by the events that led to my potentially hurting my friends in India, however, I do not intend to stop blogging. After all, if I was the type of person that felt prompted to do so by what has transpired, then likely I would not be the type of person to still be smiling after 91 days alone in Delhi.

What I do intend to do, however, is to be more sensitive if I do find myself writing about my friends in India, as they are the very last people I would ever want to hurt...