The Impact of Others—and 'Muskrat Love'

It was another bittersweet night in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) at the hospital where I volunteer each week. The night started out with the usual finger-to-elbow soap scrub and antibiotic sanitization, the check-in at the nurse’s station, and then the search for the perfect baby to rock. The night ended with a profound need to acknowledge the impact others have had on my life and the lives of others.
 

In the first NICU bay, at the first bed, was a squirmy little one who needed cuddling. I didn’t hesitate.

I don’t know if all baby rockers have elaborate conversations with the infants they hold, but I do. This baby had obviously been on this journey before. His squirms were an impatient sign that he was ready to get this life stuff going. He had things to do! People to meet! Art to create!

Yes, while holding him, I intuitively knew that he would grow up to be an artist. And that he would have something inspiring and powerful to offer the world—art that would change lives. I felt honored to hold him, and soon his impatience waned and he fell asleep. I rocked him for about 90 minutes before his nurse took him for feeding. I told the nurse that I was headed next to see my Ninja Warrior, the baby who’d been struggling for months in another bay.

She shook her head “no,” and her lip curved downward.

“About an hour ago,” was all she said.

My heart sank.

I dragged my Sketchers through the long hallway, wondering if the baby and his parents were still in the bay. They weren’t. In fact, the corner of the bay where the Ninja Warrior had fought so hard for so long—once filled with cards and prayers of encouragement—was already cleaned out, sterilized, and ready for another infant. And yet, the little one’s spirit still seemed to be there.

Boy, what a fighter! I thought. You did good, buddy. You did good. Rest now.

I started to imagine the pain his parents must be feeling—and I started to feel a debilitating sadness myself—when out of a small isolation room erupted the most thunderous cry I’d ever heard.

“Oh, you want to rock her?” asked an overwhelmed nurse with big eyes. “She’s all yours.”

Determined to comfort this baby as best I could, I returned to Expert Baby Rocker mode. I reached into the bed and gently lifted the infant into my arms. She was wrapped as tight as a bean burrito, and she tooted like she’d just eaten one too! Maybe she had gas. Maybe that was the reason that she was so irritable. NICU nurses have a name for grumpy babies like this: “hangry”—hungry and angry. These are the babies who, because of certain circumstances, get a hard start in life, and they’re quite unhappy about it. But this little girl was different. She wasn't hungry. Her diaper was dry. And yet she was inconsolable, and she proclaimed her displeasure loud and long. Repeatedly. This little girl had a feisty spirit and some lungs!

When you rock in the NICU long enough, you quickly realize that all babies are different, and that what works to comfort one doesn’t come close to easing the anxiety of another. However, all babies have a sweet spot—a position, a song or a combination of things that allows them to relax and settle into rest. This little girl was testing that reality.

I held her horizontally, her head cradled in the bend of my elbow. She cried.

I switched to the other side. She cried.

I held her up closer to my chest, and for a minute, she was silent. And then she cried.

I held her up on my left shoulder so that she could see everyone and everything better, and for a minute she was silent again. Then she cried. I switched to the right shoulder. She cried.

I rocked her, bounced her, patted her on the back and then patted her on the rump. She still cried.

I played musical chairs with this little one, trying to find her sweet spot. Nothing was working. And that’s when I remembered my kung fu training:

Never expect. Never compare.

I began to relax when it occurred to me that I'd expected her to calm down and stop crying.

Taking several deep breaths, I began accepting that it was O.K. that she was crying—that maybe that’s just what she needed to do. My job wasn’t to keep her from crying. It was to hold her. So I started to pat her on the rump while singing Captain & Tennille songs. She began to settle a little with a slow version of “Love Will Keep Us Together,” but I guess in another life she knew that Daryl Dragon and Toni Tennille got divorced, so she began to cry again.

Next I softly sang “Muskrat Love.” Now I’m not the best singer (I only sound good in the shower), but there was something about the melody of this song that made her close her eyes for a long second. Then a longer second. Then a minute. And then minutes. I watched as her face relaxed and her breathing changed pace. The monitor’s long white vertical lines clumped together, indicating my suspicion: She had fallen asleep.

I kept humming “Muskrat Love” a while longer, and as I hummed, I wondered if Willis Alan Ramsey, the guy who wrote the song, and Toni Tennille, the singer who helped make the song a hit, ever thought that something they created would be used in such a kind, loving, and powerful way—that it would be a tool to comfort a little baby who came into the world with difficulties and who just needed a little help to heal. I wondered if any of us realize how who we are and what we create affects others.

Soon, the little girl’s mom came into the room, and I handed her over. She remained calm and comfortable.

As I left the bay, I passed the empty corner where the Ninja Warrior fought his last battle, and I said a prayer for all those who would come after him—that they’d have an easier time. That they’d have first birthdays, second birthdays, kindergarten, first dates, college, and babies of their own. And I promised to tell others when they’ve had a positive impact on me—that I’d take a moment out of my day to say to people like Sifu that even though I’m a scattered brain kung fu student who has been missing a lot of class lately, I’m never not on the kung fu floor mentally. I take the art and his lessons with me every day.

So to honor the life of the Ninja Warrior, I challenge you today to reach out to someone and tell them how they’ve impacted your life.

This journey is way too short to not realize how special each of us is to one another.

A Life in Three Minutes

What do you do when you hear a NICU nurse say that the baby you’re about to rock “is incompatible with life”? Just what do you do?

I volunteer once a week in the neonatal intensive care unit of a hospital in Austin. I started volunteering in December because of the things I was learning about myself via kung fu: I love babies. (You learn a lot about yourself when you stand still enough and perform purposeful movement of a form called Siu Nim Tao.)

But I knew going in that there are things that come with the territory of a NICU unit, and rocking babies who won’t survive is one of them.

So what do you do? What do you say? You give them a life in three minutes:

You say, “Happy birthday! Happy Thanksgiving! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!”

You recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

You sing. You sing the ABCs.

You tell them that they were born in a place called the United States of America, and though it's not perfect, it's home. And then you sing “America the Beautiful”:

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America! God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

You hum the tune of every holiday song you can remember, even the ones you've always found annoying.

You say silly things like, “And the Oscar goes to…you!”

And then you sense a tear rolling down your cheek because you realize how hard it’s got to be to be that baby—and the parents. So full of hope and excitement. A life ending before it got a chance to start.

Too soon, the nurse says she needs to get a few stats, so you hand over the Little One for the first and last time, and whisper into the left ear, “Thanks for coming to visit us. Come back again when you can. And stay longer next time.”