Vicki Cockerill - NICU MUM Blog

To you... The mum, dad or family member currently sitting in the NICU ward by your baby’s side wishing them to be home for Christmas. They had a good week last week, things were looking up, surely just one more week and you would all be home? Celebrati ng your first Christmas with your NICU graduate, getting to grips with your new baby whilst making your festive lunch and opening presents, breathing a sigh of relief that you were now finally home. As a family, you were in the place where you all belonged, it wasn't meant to be though was it? There have now been a few setbacks, the test results didn't come back as they should and further action is needed over the next week. The next week, which is Christmas. The stark reality is that you will be in NICU over Christmas. No amount of knitted Santa hats, tinsel on the display boards or the mock turkey dinner in the canteen will ever make it feel like a real Christmas. You feel sick just...

Vote for me! My blog started 9 months ago now, and is considered my baby. It took 9 months of growing and it developed into something so much more than I ever imagined. It has led me to connect and meet some amazing people. I started the blog as a way of processing what I was feeling when I was suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder after the birth of Elijah. I wanted to tell my story, as if writing it down would somehow make it better, that it may help others and it did. It gave me a channel to focus everything that I was feeling and thinking and to get it out. I didn’t expect much to come of the blog when I first set it up, I didn’t even set it up one of our friends did and I had no clue what I was doing! Then it became an addiction, I had to write and write and write, the more I did the more I felt like myself again. It was if I was becoming a better version of the person I was before as I was stronger, I had a focus and a purpose to help others who were going through t...