Baby Therapy

Today was my first day as a volunteer in the newborn nursery at a local hospital, and it was amazing. This all started at the beginning of the summer when I decided to call the hospital to see if they needed volunteers to hold babies and to my surprise...she said yes and that the orientation was later that night. A couple fingerprints, a background check, and a TB test later, I was cleared to become a volunteer. After getting my badge today, the volunteer coordinator showed me how to do the three minute scrub down. Then, I put on a long sleeve yellow robe with an open back, and she brought me into the nursery. Most of the babies were in the little plastic mini-cribs, but some were still in incubators. This nursery is where the babies from nicu are placed once they are well enough to leave the nicu, but they aren't well enough to go home yet. My first baby was a sweet black baby boy...precious. I rocked him for probably 30 minutes. He liked to keep one of his hands untucked from his swaddle so that he could make sure that his paci didn't fall out. And then a baby started crying so I put my first baby down, changed my gown, washed up again, and held a sweet black baby girl. She had a little heart monitor on her foot so I had to move my chair over to her station to hold her. She was funny because she wanted to check out who was holding her, but she was only willing to open one eye. I can't describe to you how blessed I feel to have the opportunity to hold these little miracles. I miss them already!