After a number of weeks in Neo-natal Intensive Care, our premature baby twins were doing amazing and progressing well, so well in fact, that they were soon able to breathe on their own, and no longer needed oxygen support.
One of the nurses handed me a tiny bit of rubber and said: “I thought you might like this for their keepsake box”. I took it from her, smiled but it was only after I thanked her that I realised what it was. It was so small, yet it had been such an incredibly important piece of equipment for our baby and yes, of course I wanted to keep it to remind us what an amazing journey they had been on. A tiny oxygen mask hardly bigger than my thumbnail.
And yet, I was embarrassed. Keepsake Box? I was stuffing all their mementos in an old Pampers nappy bag!
Such an important journey for all of us, one that would certainly change our family’s perspective on life from that point, and I was about to shuv these precious items in a nappy bag! And so it struck me that sometimes we need to create time to think about how we store, file, preserve all sorts of items……..all through life…….. and so it began.
And the mask? It’s now in a keepsake box of course!