THE DAY THAT CHANGED MY LIFE

Listen as I discuss the night my daughter was born and how that has shaped and impacted our lives for the past 10 years.

TRIGGER WARNING - I discuss birth trauma, disabilities and other sensitive topics.

Transcript

[00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.

[00:15] You already know who it is. It's your girl, Sugar. And I back with episode 24 of the Need Some Sugar podcast. So I just want to be honest with y'all.

[00:22] This episode is going to get a little deep. I will be discussing the night my daughter was born. That is why I titled this episode the Day that Changed My Life.

[00:30] Because that, in fact, is the day that changed my life. I just want to give a trigger warning. I will be talking about birth trauma, ptsd, cerebral palsy, autism. So if you're sensitive to these type of subjects, you're more than welcome to click off and support the show in other ways,

[00:45] support the next couple episodes or the episodes before this. But I just want to give you guys a trigger warning so that I'm not ******* up the rest of your day with my sad story.

[00:55] Okay? So with all that being said, let's get to it. Thank you so much for tuning in to the NISA Channel. I titled this episode the Data Changed My life.

[01:02] Because on September 11, 2014, that is, in fact, the day that changed my life. Had I known that the events that happened that night were to happen, I would have asked more questions.

[01:12] I would have did a whole bunch of **** differently, right? And I feel like we all feel that way when it comes to things that happened in our past. We think back on that event or that specific time in our life and we're like, ****, I wish I asked this question.

[01:25] I wish I did this. I wish I did that. I wish I would have known this, this, and that. But that is when you have to give yourself grace and know that you did nothing wrong.

[01:33] You did exactly what you were supposed to do in that moment with the information that you had during that time. And it's not good for you to blame yourself or feel guilty now.

[01:43] Blame and guilt naturally come when something bad happens. But you also have to remember that some things that happen to you are not your fault. And some things just happen.

[01:52] The night my daughter was born, I've went over that night in my head a million times. My daughter is 10 years old now, and I tell y'all, I have replayed it.

[02:00] I've done it differently in my mind. I've said, I should have asked this question. I should have asked that question. I should have asked for that. I should have asked for this.

[02:07] I should have advocated better for that. I've had 10 years of feeling like, ****, did I do something wrong? Did I not ask enough questions? Did I not do something right?

[02:18] I also want to tell you guys that the reason why I'm comfortable enough talking about this now is I've recently talked about it in therapy and I've been able to get a lot of the emotion behind it out.

[02:29] Even though this story does still make me cry to this day, I think this story probably will make me cry for the rest of my life. And that is a reason why I haven't really talked about it.

[02:39] Because I'm like, ****, I don't want to cry. This is something very traumatic is sad. I'm not a sad person. I don't want to be talking about sad ****. But it's also a big piece of my life and it is part of my story.

[02:51] So it's like, why don't you want to share this huge part of your life that you still have to deal with on a daily basis? Of course I take care of my daughter, so I am constantly reminded of the things that happened to her when she was born, certain things that happen,

[03:07] certain milestones. She's not reaching. I'm just like, ****, had my baby been taken care of better or had this not happened, we wouldn't be dealing with this. So on a daily basis I am faced with my trauma, I am faced with things that happened in the past.

[03:23] However, like I said, going to therapy has helped me take some of that guilt off my shoulders and just actually breathe and know that I did nothing wrong. Because it is very hard for me as a mother to not think that, ****, I could have done something differently and my baby would have been all right today.

[03:39] And that's not to say she's not alright today, but my baby has special needs. She has a developmental delay, she has autism, cerebral palsy, hydrocephalus. So it's like these ailments or these disabilities she will have to deal with for the rest of her life and so will I.

[03:53] And I know we shouldn't do the woulda, coulda, shoulda's because whatever happened, happened and it is what it is and we need to take what actually happened and, and deal with it as such.

[04:04] But I'm a mom and I can't help for my brain to go to those places where I'm like, ****, what if I did this? What if they didn't do that?

[04:12] What if, what if, what if? And I get caught in the what if a lot. And that is what makes me cry sometimes and that is what makes me feel guilty.

[04:20] Let's start out with the night she was born. My daughter was born September 11, 2014 at 1:15am so technically, my labor and all of this story started the night before on September 10, 2014.

[04:34] I also want to get this out there early. My due date was September 15th, so I was right there, full term. My daughter wasn't premature or anything like that. I wanted to make that clear because I know a lot of the things that happen to my daughter typically happen to premature babies.

[04:48] So the day before my daughter was born, I was at my Wella's house and I started to experience some contractions. I had went to the bathroom and when I wiped myself, I had a lot of mucus coming out and I'm like, okay, this is my mucus plug.

[05:02] I just felt a little uncomfortable, but nothing where I was like, okay, I think I'm in labor, I think I need to go to the hospital. I started to have what I believed to be contractions.

[05:12] I called the doctor and they said that, oh, are you experiencing this? Are you experiencing that? And I'm like, no. They said, okay, well the doctor doesn't suggest you go to the hospital just yet.

[05:22] Go to the hospital if. Blah, blah, blah. So I, I waited until my daughter's father had got off work that night. I believe it was around 8 or 9 o'clock at night because I just was feeling a little uncomfortable, but I wasn't really experiencing any contractions.

[05:37] It wasn't until we picked him up that I started to feel a lot of discomfort in my belly. And I'm like, I think I'm having contractions now. So for me, the timing kind of worked out perfectly.

[05:48] Me and my mom picked him up from work and we went straight to the hospital. Soon as I got to the hospital, they put me in a triage room and they put those monitors on, those blue and pink monitors on.

[05:58] I believe they're for the baby's heart rate. I don't know the correct process for that, but I believe that it's when you have a contraction, your baby's heart rate goes down, or flip that.

[06:08] Regardless, they put those monitors on me and they weren't able to get a good reading on my baby's heart rate. And the nurse just chucked it up to. She was just uncomfortable and the baby might be moving around and blah, blah, blah.

[06:20] So this is my first pregnancy. I didn't think anything of it. I'm just like, oh, okay, well, the baby's just moving around, she can't get a good reading, but my baby's okay overall.

[06:30] I don't know how long I was sitting in that triage, but the fact that my daughter was born at 1:15am and we got to the hospital around 9:00, 9:30. I want to say I was in that triage room for two hours.

[06:43] They had came in and told me that the doctor wants to admit me. I believe that was about two hours later. I was very uncomfortable the whole entire time. They asked me to go to the bathroom and give them a urine sample.

[06:54] Not to be too tmi, but I don't even think I was able to pee. I just scooped up mucus and that's what was in that cup I gave to that lady.

[07:02] And I told her, I said, I don't think I can pee. Like, it hurts so bad for me to move right now. They also tried to get blood from me.

[07:09] I don't know if they actually got it and I don't know what the blood work was for. It's just a whole bunch of **** was going on all at once.

[07:16] They said that the doctor wanted to admit me. At this point, it was still no urgency behind it. It just was, okay, we're going to admit you. So I'm like, oh, okay, I'm in active labor now.

[07:25] Like, **** is getting real. I'm about to have my baby. And they gave me the impression that I was about to start pushing soon anyway. When they put me in a different room, that was the room I was admitted to.

[07:36] The doctor had came in and did an internal exam. He said, oh, the baby ****. From my research, before I even had a baby, I was like, oh, I don't think that's a good thing.

[07:45] The baby could breathe that in and it could get her her lungs and a whole bunch of other **** could happen. So I was assuming that was about to start moving very fast.

[07:53] Once he said that, he asked one of the nurses for an ultrasound machine. He did the ultrasound. He said, yeah, we need to prep her for an emergency C section now.

[08:01] He still was going to make me push even after he said that the baby pooped. Once he did the ultrasound, he said, oh, no, prep her for a C section.

[08:08] We have to do a C section now. Now I don't know if they planned on putting me to sleep. I don't know what the plan was. But when I went back into that OR room, the anesthesiologist was asking me a couple questions.

[08:19] He seen that I still had a bra on. He was like, she still has a bra on. And I looked at him and I was like, I'm sorry. And he said, oh, it's okay, honey.

[08:27] And then the next thing I remember, I Was getting woken up from surgery. When I woke up from surgery, I looked to my left. It's the nurse hooking me up to fluids and, you know, getting me right on her end.

[08:37] And then to my right, I believe was my mom and my child's father. When I looked at my mom, her skin just looked very flushed, and I'm just like, oh, okay.

[08:45] Well, ****** is tired.

[08:47] I heard a baby start crying, and I thought that was Nyana. So when I heard the baby start crying, I was like, where's my baby now? Mind y'all. I couldn't really talk like that because my throat was sore because I had a breathing tube in.

[08:59] When they did the emergency C section, the nurse was like, oh, the doctor is going to come in and talk to you in a minute. The doctor's going to come and talk.

[09:06] Okay, but. But I still didn't think anything was wrong up until this point, because I'm like, okay. Usually when you have a baby, they go clean them up, they go get them, right?

[09:16] And then they bring them to you. I probably literally just got woken up from the surgery, and they're getting my baby together, and they're gonna bring her to me. They had me in a recovery room where there was another woman with her baby, and that's the baby that I heard.

[09:29] Nayana was not in the room with us when the other pediatrician came in. From what I remember, he just. He said the baby had a 5 to 10% chance of surviving.

[09:38] The baby wasn't broke breathing. The baby had a brain bleed. Blah, blah, blah. Like, it was so much information he dumped on me. Mind y'all, I'm still kind of waking up from surgery.

[09:47] He just dumped a whole bunch of information on me and basically said, we have to transport her to chop. So now I know something went wrong. Now I'm worried my mom's about to start crying.

[09:57] I asked, could I see my baby? They said yes, but the CHOP doctors had to stabilize her for transport. And then I will be able to go back to see her.

[10:05] When she finally was ready for us to see her, they had to wheel me, of course, in my hospital bed with. When they wheeled me in that room, I just seen a whole bunch of doctors surrounding my baby.

[10:14] It was at least six or seven doctors and nurses surrounding my baby, working on her. I believe at this point, she was already on a ventilator and hooked up to a whole bunch of ****.

[10:24] For that to be the first time you see your child, it is kind of traumatic and it's sad. Because you're like, wow, my baby is hooked up to all these machines, all these monitors, all these doctors are working on her.

[10:35] But I also was like, God, thank you for having all these doctors working on her, and my baby is going to be okay. Something that did make me smile is when I seen her, I said, oh, my God.

[10:45] I got a big, chunky, light skinned baby. Like, that is my baby right there. And that kind of made me happy. But seeing her on the ventilator already and seeing her hooked up to all those machines, I was like, oh, my God.

[10:57] Like, what is wrong with my baby? What's going on? I wanted to know what was going on right then and there. But they said that they had to get her to Chop so they can really work on her.

[11:05] All this stuff was temporary just so that they can transport her. So they said, is a family member coming? And my mom was like, I'll go. My mom was the one who went with Nayiona, because of course, I had to stay at the hospital so I can heal because I just had a C section.

[11:19] They told me that I would need to stay in the hospital myself for two to three days. And Chop would call and let me know what was going on. And of course, I felt comfortable enough sending my baby because my mom was going.

[11:29] And I knew that my mom would tell me also what's going on. And I trusted that my mom would ask all the right questions and be all up on those people.

[11:36] Cause this is her grandbaby. Not only was this her first grandbaby, but something traumatic just happened. So my mom was like, I'm going to the hospital with her, and I'mma let y'all know what's going on as well.

[11:46] That night, I just got some rest. I don't think I really asked about what was going on with Nyanna. I think my mom said, like, once they got too chopped, they just was working on her and working on her and working on her.

[11:58] They told me that they had to put my daughter on a cooling blanket to stop her brain damage. And she experienced a grade 4 brain bleed during her delivery, which at this point, I still don't understand what the severity of that is.

[12:10] I just know brain bleed, brain damage, all of that stuff is not good, and especially not good for a baby. So this was worrying me to my core. I still tried to keep faith.

[12:19] I still tried to keep positive. I kept praying to God, like, please put your hands of healing on my baby. Please make sure she's okay. There was really nothing that I could do.

[12:28] While I was in the hospital, but just heal and wait to get discharged so that I could go be with my baby. And like I said, my mom went up there, so I knew that my baby was good regardless.

[12:38] While I was healing from my C section and waiting to get discharged, I just got a slew of phone calls. It was so many phone calls from the hospital. They were asking permission to do this, to do that.

[12:48] They were just dumping a whole bunch of information and medical terminology on me. They were asking about family history and all rightfully so. I'm not gonna say that I was annoyed with it.

[12:58] It just was very overwhelming. They were like, does anybody in the family have a blood clotting issue? Does anybody in the family have this? Does anybody in your family have that?

[13:07] And I'm like, no, no, no, no. Most of my answers to their question was no. And that also leads me to believe that something went wrong during her delivery and it wasn't anything genetic.

[13:21] We also got genetic testing done after she was born just to make sure the things that happened to her did not have anything to do with me or her father's genesis.

[13:30] So just imagine that you're in the hospital healing from your C section. People who've been through this, you don't even have to imagine you have a C section. This is your first child.

[13:39] They tell you something went wrong, she has a 5 to 10% chance of surviving. The first time you see your baby, she's surrounded by doctors. They got a ventilator on her already.

[13:48] When they actually transport her to the children's hospital, they're calling you talking about, can we do this? Can we do that? This is going on, that is going on, that your, your baby is experiencing this, your baby is experiencing that.

[14:00] Do you have a family of this, a family history of that? And then they tell you that they have to cool your baby's body down to stop brain damage. And they don't know the long term effects at this point of the brain damage that she has just experienced at birth.

[14:15] They just knew that she was one of the sickest babies at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia at that time. One of the doctors said that word for word. To have a doctor tell you that your child is one of the sickest babies at a children's hospital, that that just sees a slew of illnesses.

[14:32] I don't want to say it's discouraging. I don't want to say the doctor said anything wrong, but it put a lot of things in perspective where I was like, not in denial.

[14:41] But I'm like, my baby's gonna be okay. Which at the very end of the day, she was okay. She's still here. It's been 10 years. They didn't think that she would live this long.

[14:51] They didn't think she would live past a day, past a week, past a month. And she is here 10 years later. So I do want to say I look at the positive side of this whole experience as being my baby survived, my baby made it.

[15:05] I will say that it's still very hard for me to accept that, oh, my daughter just came out like that and nothing went wrong and no one made a bad call, or no one waited too long to do something, or no one did their job right.

[15:17] I've said this before, and I fully understand that things happen that are out of a doctor's control. But the thought that my baby's C section was called probably too late.

[15:26] And just to think that a doctor was just lollygagging around the hospital and also in the next room with another patient,

[15:34] you hear them in there laughing whole time. Your baby's in distress, losing oxygen by the minute. And when the baby finally does get delivered, your baby has a grade 4 brain bleed that has caused brain damage and ailments that you and her have to deal with for the rest of your lives.

[15:49] I do recognize the favor that God has on my life and my daughter's life because some people don't get to bring a baby home. All I can say is my baby fought for her ******* life in that hospital.

[16:01] She's been through multiple brain surgeries after this. She has had multiple seizures. Oh, you lost the ability to say your ABCs. We bout to teach you the ABCs again. Don't worry, we got it, boo boo.

[16:12] We're gonna keep thriving, keep trying. My daughter has thrived. My daughter has beat the odds. Those doctors said that my daughter would never walk, she would never talk, she would never be able to feed herself.

[16:23] And my baby has done all of that. She just recently got diagnosed with cerebral palsy. But. But she's met the qualifications or characteristics to be diagnosed with cerebral palsy since she was about 2 or 3.

[16:35] She took a little minute to walk. And I don't hate the doctors for saying these things, for saying that she wouldn't walk, she wouldn't talk, she wouldn't do this, she wouldn't do that.

[16:43] Because they're going off of their medical experience and their schooling and things that they've saw and things that they know to be true. And I listened to them I said, oh, okay.

[16:52] But I still took my baby, and we did what we had to do. I tried to help my baby walk the best I could. I honestly believe that me talking so much and me talking to her regularly and me really pouring into my baby is the reason why she started talking and she starts singing.

[17:10] My baby can remember a song the first time you play it for her. She'll be able to sing a lyric as soon as you turn the song off. She's in the back singing the chorus that she just heard.

[17:20] So you can't tell me that my baby is not doing the **** thing. My daughter came home with a feeding tube in her nose. They told me that she would never be able to feed herself.

[17:29] She will always have to get a feeding tube. She kept pulling that **** out of her nose. So I said, all right. I told my baby at a couple months old, I said, you keep pulling out this feeding tube, and you don't like when I have to put it back in.

[17:43] If you pull it out again, you better be ready to drink a bottle. Do y'all know the next time my baby pulled her feeding tube out of her nose, I gave her a bottle and she drank.

[17:52] That *****. When I tell y'all, she finished 4 ounces of milk like it was normal for her. Like, she does this. This is what she do. Now. She was on a feeding tube because she wasn't able to drink out of a bottle.

[18:04] They basically said that she would choke if I tried to give her milk. I put some oatmeal in there, made that **** kind of thick, and she downed 4 ounces of milk, like I said, as if she's been doing this ****.

[18:17] And from that day forward, my baby never needed a feeding tube again. When I took her for a follow up, those people were like, oh, she doesn't have her feeding tube in?

[18:26] I said, no, she pulled it out, and she's been drinking milk ever since. They said, oh, she could choke. I said, yeah, that's what I thought, too. She's been drinking 4-6oz of milk with oatmeal in it, like it's nothing.

[18:39] So I showed them at the doctor's office. The lady was impressed. She said. She said, okay, well, it doesn't seem like she needs to be followed up with us anymore.

[18:47] She gave me a couple things to look out for, and she said, Nyana would need to come back and see them if she did experience those things, choking and all that stuff.

[18:55] But from that day forward, like I said y'all, Nyana Was drinking a bottle and then of course that turned into eating food. I started her with early intervention. She was in ot, pt, speech, all of that I would like to say Nayana started talking when regular kids talk.

[19:11] My baby was singing, talking, bopping, her head, moving, understanding what we were saying to her from a very young age. I feel like she was right on time with her development when it came to talking and words and things like that.

[19:23] Now still to this day she has to wear braces on her legs that help her walk because her legs are weak. She has cerebral palsy. This is something that probably will make her legs weak for the rest of her life.

[19:33] It kind of sucks seeing her legs give out on her because she, she's getting bigger. Of course she's going to get heavier, taller. And I don't know the full explanation of why.

[19:41] I have to talk to her physical therapist about it, but it seems like with the cerebral palsy, the muscles in her legs take longer to catch up with her body weight.

[19:50] Like she's a 10 year old. She's about a hundred pounds now. Her legs do keep her up, but she needs a walker at school for long distances. She still is in a medical stroller and she's not able to walk without assistance.

[20:02] She's not able to walk without tripping or falling. Her legs and knees give out on her sometimes. So the cerebral palsy still affects my baby to this day. Although she did start walking eventually.

[20:13] Although she can stand up, although she can get around, it's still a struggle for her and she does need support via transport devices or you know, just things to hold her up, handles and things of that nature.

[20:26] We do live on a second floor of a building now and my baby impressed me with walking up and down the steps, holding the rails by herself. I really was concerned when I moved here.

[20:35] I'm like, oh my gosh, my daughter's probably going to struggle. I'm probably going to have to carry her up the steps. But nope, she's been walking up and down the steps by herself.

[20:43] I don't even need to hold her hand. So throughout the years I can say that my baby has thrived, my baby has made it. I'm super proud of that little girl.

[20:52] Like she really, really tries. Physically, my baby can't walk the best, she can't walk long distances. We still trying to get her leg strength up and also she's not using the bathroom.

[21:03] So I'm like, I don't know if that's a cognitive thing or if that's physical or A combination of both. And I'm also trying to talk to her about, you know, mommy's going to change your *** and a baby's ***.

[21:12] Like, come on, girl, be a big sister and help Mommy out. One thing that always makes me smile is regardless of my baby's autism, cerebral palsy, hydrocephalus, developmental delay, all that ****, right when my baby goes into a room, she commands the room.

[21:28] She's the center of attention. She's this big personality. She's just everything.

[21:33] No matter who she's talking to, no matter who she encounters, no matter who gets to know her, she's just a ball of light. And you. And my baby just makes you smile.

[21:41] She makes you happy. And I'm like, this is my daughter. Nyona Lee is my daughter. Like, I really birthed myself, and she just got special needs. That's it. I always like to believe that God picked me to be Nayana's mom because he was like, you're going to do right by this little girl.

[22:01] You're going to do the **** thing when it comes to this little girl. You're going to do your absolute best when it comes to this little girl. So I entrust you to be the person that takes care of her for the rest of her life.

[22:12] And when you think about it that way, it kind of makes this life a little bit easier for me, because I can't tell you how many nights where I was like, why me?

[22:21] Why us? Why my baby? Like, why did this have to happen? This is not fair. I don't understand, Lord, why? And then I just shifted my perspective, and I was like, lord, I know what you did there.

[22:32] Like, I was meant to be Nyana's mom. Couldn't nobody take care of Nayana the way I took care of Nayana. Couldn't nobody teach her and train her up and do the things I did with Nayana.

[22:42] It was. It was destined for me to do what I did with my daughter. And I always say my favorite thing about myself is how great of a mother I am and how much I pour into my baby.

[22:53] And I have a new bundle of joy on the way, and I'm just going to keep pouring into my children, and I'm going to be the best mom that I could be.

[22:59] I love being a mom. It's just taking care of Nyana is a lot. And I was like, I'm not having another baby. One, because I'm traumatized from the birth of Nayana.

[23:09] And two, Nayona requires so much out of me that I don't think it would be fair to bring another child into this world. And I still have to give Nayana a lot of my attention.

[23:19] But then I had to remember that I do have to allow my baby to be independent and I do have to allow my baby to do certain things on her own.

[23:27] And I can handle more children. I deserve to have more children. And I look forward to when Nyana could show her little brother or sister, you know, her favorite shows like, hey, let's watch Barney, let's watch Peppa Pig and things like that.

[23:39] So even though my daughter has a developmental delay, I know that she will be the best big sister. And I know that my kids are going to be the best of friends.

[23:47] I don't worry about, oh, I'm not going to have no help taking care of two kids. Like, I do have the help this time around. And I know that I'm having my second child at the right time.

[23:57] Although they have an actual 10 year age gap, because Nyana functions like a 3 or 4 year old cognitively, they will only have a 3 to 4 year age gap.

[24:06] I'm so happy to be expanding my family now. I'm glad I made the decision to do that. And I also believe that my past traumas was stopping my body physically from conceiving because I have not been on birth control or any type of contraceptive.

[24:20] I don't want to get too deep in spiritual with y'all because my spirituality is very private and it's something I hold very close to my chest because people think you crazy sometimes when you say certain.

[24:29] But I will say I subconsciously did not want to have any more kids and I did not deal with the trauma of the night my daughter was born. So I believe my body was not conceiving because my body was like, you are not ready to have a child.

[24:45] You do not want to have a child. It has not been the right time to have a child. You need to release these emotions. You need to be more at peace, you need to center yourself more, and then you'll have the baby when your body is ready to conceive.

[24:57] After starting my healing journey, after starting yoga, after opening my hips up and just letting all those stored emotions go, I get pregnant after months of me, you know, just releasing any stored trauma.

[25:10] I was doing a lot of somatic yoga, and then next thing you know, I'm pregnant. And mind y'all, my boyfriend has been asking me for a baby for like two years now.

[25:18] And I'm like, oh, after this, after that, after this after that, I got you. We could do it after this. After that, after my birthday? You have been through so much yourself.

[25:26] And you have not properly grieved or felt any of these emotions. You have to let them go. Before you bring another life into this world. You have to let all that trauma go.

[25:37] This pregnancy is not like the last one. Everything is good. Everything is going to be okay. Please do not bring that trauma into this pregnancy. That's not fair to you or your baby.

[25:47] Nayana is okay. Focus on the present. Focus on the now. You wake your daughter up every morning for school. She can ask for what she wants. Your daughter is loved.

[25:56] She's thriving in life. When you compare it to what they said she wouldn't be doing at this time, she's made it. It's been 10 years. It is time to let it go.

[26:06] Or a better way to put it is it's time to release it. It's time to know that that is part of your story. That is not the story. That does not have to have a hold on the rest of your life.

[26:16] You do not have to carry this fear, pregnancy to pregnancy, year to year, child to child. That is something traumatic that happened and it will not happen again. And if it does, you know what to do.

[26:28] You know how to advocate for yourself now. You know what questions to ask for. You're wiser now. You're older now. You have more experience now. So there's nothing for me to worry about anymore.

[26:39] I just have to trust that I know what I'm doing and I'm going to be okay. My baby is going to be okay. Nayana is okay. I have poured a lot into my baby.

[26:48] And she is thriving to this day. And that is what I will leave you with. Nayana having the fighting spirit that she was born with, and me being the mother that I am.

[26:57] That is why my baby is thriving still to this day and will continue to thrive. And that's why we're gonna end this on a more positive note. Because my baby is thriving, y'all.

[27:07] I am looking for a lawyer because I will be pursuing the hospital again. I stopped about five years ago. Cause I'm like, I am tired of telling this story. Like, I just wanna take care of my baby and I just wanna make sure she's okay.

[27:19] I know this was a heavy episode. I don't know if I wanna say I hope you enjoyed listening, but. But that is part of my story. September 11, 2014, is the day that changed my life forever.

[27:31] I always knew that I was going to be a great mom. I was very excited to be pregnant. I did not know that I had it in me to be the mom that I am today and to advocate for my baby the way I do and to fight for my baby the way I do.

[27:44] And I thank God that I am the way I am. That's why I said God chose me to be Nayiona's mom, because he knew. He knew this girl with her big personality and her assertiveness and her boldness, she's going to get this baby the care that she needs.

[27:59] She's going to take care of this baby the way she's supposed to. She's going to get the best schooling, she's going to get the best devices. She's going to get the best equipment.

[28:07] This girl is going to pour her all into this child, and this girl is going to fight for this baby. So this is who needs to be this child's mom.

[28:14] And I'm thankful for that, because who else could be Nayana's mom but me? Like, imagine that. Who? Let's take a breath together. That was very heavy. I know that episode was a lot.

[28:25] I don't know if you cried. I cried a couple times. So if you hear some cuts in the audio where it sounds a little weird, that's because I literally had to take out big chunks of audio where I was crying.

[28:36] I had to take a step back, recollect myself, and then come back to y'all and try to tell y'all the rest of the story through therapy and healing and just accepting the now for what it is.

[28:46] And just looking at the way my baby is thriving today in 2025, I'm like, we are okay. What Kendrick Lamar say, we gonna be all right, and we are all right.

[28:55] We've been all right, and we're gonna be all right. Thank you guys so much for tuning into the podcast episode. You can support the podcast for as little as $3 a month with the support the show button somewhere on the website.

[29:07] You also could send us fan mail. I definitely wanna know your thoughts and what you guys think of the podcast as a whole. So please leave that fan mail. Do not be afraid to leave fan mail.

[29:16] It is complet.

[29:17] I just want to know your thoughts on the episodes on the podcast in general. So please leave fan mail if you're not afraid to. Like I said, it's anonymous. Anyway, thank you so much for tuning into the Need Some Sugar podcast.

[29:29] And like I always say, it's good, but it needs some sugar. Bye.