I didn’t make it at home 24 hours without having to call the hospital. It was the right thing to do, for my own sanity, but proved having one child already did not absolve me of the fear of being a new parent a second time around.

It was close to 11 that night. I was lying in bed listening to all the squeaks I knew this time around, that babies made while they slept.  I on the other hand, was getting no sleep. It seemed just as soon as I wondered to myself how soon I would put the boy in his own crib as opposed to the Moses basket next to my side of the bed, that I heard that horrible sound…

I jumped out of bed, in increasing pain from moving in a direction my stitches did not want me to move—never mind so quickly, turned on the light and looked into the basket to see my 4-day-old son had gotten sick. It was all over the basket, all over his face.

I scooped him up, cleaned him up, held him tightly and hit the first number in my address book on my phone. I’d saved the number to labor and delivery from the time my daughter was born.

I explained to the nurse what happened. She calmly asked me if he’d eaten recently. I glanced over at the log on my nightstand to give her the exact time he’d finished eating—- 22 minutes earlier. She told me he probably had a bubble in his belly and was just getting it out—along with all he’d eaten.

I started to cry… I don’t know if they were tears of relief or just my hormones sending me into one of those weepy episodes. She asked sweetly if that had ever happened to my daughter. I said no, and began crying harder. I’d just remembered right before it happened, I was wondering to myself when I’d put him in his own room so I could get some sleep. I felt guilty for having such a selfish thought and cried to the nurse, asking what would have happened if I didn’t hear him, if he would have choked.

I was no longer in the hospital but still the nurses there were coming to my rescue. It was clear I was not the first mother to worry about such a thing, and if I was, this nurse made me feel as if I wasn’t. She must have been a mother. She understood the worry I will now carry with me forever—two times over.