New father needing advice
I’ll try to keep this as clear and concise as I can. My daughter was born April 3. The entire pregnancy was perfectly healthy and normal, no complications literally whatsoever. She was even born full term (40 weeks). However when she was born, my wife’s uterus ruptured and they had to do an emergency C section. Long story short my daughter was born legally dead; no pulse, no breathing, nothing at all. We were told godawful things the first week or so, that she was brain dead, would never walk, talk, eat, breathe, even be aware in any sense of the word. We were literally told to start thinking about stopping life support for her. By the grace of God, the last 6 weeks we’ve been here she’s shown remarkable improvement; she can move, track with her eyes, regulate her temp, breathe on her own, and more. She still can’t swallow but we’re looking into therapies to help her with that.
But even with all those wonderful things the stress is immense, maybe even worse now. So I just started a new job in HVAC as a helper role. I know very little to nothing about the trade right now but I’m with a great company that is willing to train me, pay for schooling etc. so I’ll get there, but needless to say I’m not making a lot of money. Given my daughter’s situation my wife now is assuming the role of her caretaker and will not work a paying job. Totally reasonable and I admire her courage and strength for doing that, as I know that’s gonna be 10x harder than any job I have. Obviously though it doesn’t pay anything at all. So I’m now the sole provider for her, myself, our cats, and our daughter. She said she wants to move into a new, cleaner, nicer apartment, and we found one, but it’s around $2500 a month, which would be doable if we both worked, but now that she isn’t, it’s all on me to come up with the money. Not to mention car payments, insurance, utilities, pet stuff, therapies, medical costs, everything. We’re also looking into stem cell treatments which are VERY expensive, but we are 100% doing it somehow because the promise it has to help my daughter is priceless.
But I feel totally alone in life right now. I have my wife and daughter and I love them unconditionally, but my wife, my family, her family, etc don’t seem to understand that I went through horrific trauma too, I thought my whole family died on April 3. I also feel as though everyone just kinda expects me to “stay strong” and figure it all out. Any time I’ve tried to talk to my wife or her family or even my family about what I’m going through, it either ends in a fight, with them telling me to just be a man and handle it, or reverting the conversation back to how she and the baby are doing, completely dismissing me. It feels as though no one really cares about me, and I feel this negative energy around her family like they think I’m not good enough or something, and even my wife has said some things that make me feel that way.
Bottom line, I have no idea how I’m supposed to go on like this, how I’m supposed to provide for these extremely expensive treatments, expensive apartment, all the bills, food, car stuff, pet stuff, by myself. My family said they’ll help but they’re not made of money either, eventually we’re all going to reach our limit. And I’m terrified what my wife and her family will do and say when that day comes. I try so hard every day but it never feels like it’s enough, financially, emotionally what have you.
I’m just kinda at my limit. I hate being here in the NICU for as long as we have been. I’m so mad at the world, mad at God for letting this happen, mad at myself for not doing more during her birth, mad at my family for not trying to understand my point of view, mad at her family for dismissing me and telling me to man up, and honestly mad at my wife for always finding something I’m doing that’s wrong. I have the weight of the world on my shoulders right now and I don’t know how to carry it. I’ve honestly thought about just ending it all at times because it feels like everyone either doesn’t care or is against me for some reason, even though all I’m doing is trying to do the best I can. It’s so, so hard some days.
How did you guys cope with the cards you were dealt? Did any other dads and husbands feel the same?
Also want to add I’m never, ever giving up on my family, until the bitter end. I’ll always try to do what’s best for my daughter. But dammit this is exhausting, stressful, terrifying, maddening…I just want to feel like somebody out there gives a damn. Sorry if this was confusing. I tried to make it clear. I’ll answer any questions to clarify things. I’m not even sure what I’m looking to get from this, but there you have it. Thanks