One Month

In Oaklee’s first month, we learned that our NICU journey would be hard the whole way through. We learned that no matter how well our baby was doing, this part of the journey was still next to unnavigable. We were making progress, yes, but we were exhausting ourselves with both the places we needed to be and the perception of the places we needed to be. We were exhausting ourselves with our responsibilities, our relationships and our minds.

7.30.17

“For being warned that this journey would be a rollercoaster, flip flopping between compressed/gavage and CPAP/no CPAP isn’t so bad considering where we started… I will be very ready to take Oaklee home when we get to. I’m grateful we’ve had a little more time to prepare at home, so in a weird way, this has been good, but I just want it to be over with now.”

On the 29th, Oaklee was one month old. She’d spent 31 days in Area 11 of the NICU. We’d spent 31 days going to and from our child who was confined to one of two rooms she’d ever been in. While she laid in her isolette, her only responsibilities sleeping, eating and breathing, we ran around like chickens with their heads cut off, always feeling like we should be somewhere else.

Any NICU parent – and especially a long term one – can tell you in some fashion about the schedule guilt they faced when their child did time in the NICU. Where should you be? The hospital? Home? Work? Surrounded by your friends and family? In hindsight, I see there was no right answer, but in the moment, I was convinced there was one and I was never getting it right.

I’m at the hospital, and I feel like I’m wasting my time, like I should be at home setting up our nursery.

I’m at home, and I feel like I should be with my baby, like I might be missing out on a “first” we’ll never get back.

I’m at work, and I feel like I should be surrounded by friends and family, like I can’t be myself with my co-workers because I can’t be emotionally eratic at work.

I’m surrounded by my friends and family and I feel like I should just be with my baby, like she’s the only person in the entire world that matters right now.

In so many ways our lives were both put on hold and expedited at the same time. We needed to be in several places at once, but we needed to focus on our baby. Deciphering what that looked like or how to do it best was no easy task.

Kevin and I struggled to say yes to our typical summer lives. Was it ok to enjoy watching a movie, sitting by a campfire, going boating or hanging out with our friends? Was it ok to enjoy being away from the stress of the hospital? Was it ok to enjoy anything when our baby was fighting for her life?

Throughout our first month of NICU life we learned we had to take time for ourselves or we weren’t our best selves for our baby. We learned we couldn’t be “doing” or “going” 100% of the time. We sometimes just had to “be”.

Unfortunately, the hospital is not a place you can just “be”. You don’t just get to snuggle with your baby on your living room couch in your jammies. You can snuggle, sure, but while you do, you’ll be half dressed in a room full of people with cloth screens as your only length of privacy and a monitoring of your baby’s hopefully good looking vitals as your entertainment. And mid-snuggle, you might have a nurse tell you it’s time to put your baby back in her isolette. Or you might have a doctor come in and chat with your half naked, skin-to-skin-practicing self about how your baby failed her trial off the CPAP. Or you might have an isolette across the room get filled with a new, critically ill baby fresh from her mother’s womb. You can’t just “be” in the NICU.

So every Sunday morning we would make a tube of Pillsbury cinnamon rolls and a pot of coffee and watch our church’s sermon from the previous week on a computer in our living room before going up to the hospital. On Saturdays we’d either sleep in and take care of things around the house before heading up and spending the second half of the day there or we’d get up early, get to the hospital and leave with enough time to run some errands or relax at home.

In Oaklee’s first month, we learned that our NICU journey would be hard the whole way through. We learned that no matter how well our baby was doing, this part of the journey was still next to unnavigable. We were making progress, yes, but we were exhausting ourselves with both the places we needed to be and the perception of the places we needed to be. We were exhausting ourselves with our responsibilities, our relationships and our minds.

It’d been one month.

We were exhausted.

Oscillator –> Ventilator –> CPAP –> Feeder Grower –> CPAP

In the stats:
Birth weight: 2lb, 12oz
Last known weight: 3lb 13oz (7/29/17)
Gestational Age: 32 weeks, 1 day
Days in the hospital: 31
Sets of visitors to see Oaklee: 29
Days on High Frequency Oscillator: 2
Days on Ventilator: 1
Days on CPAP: 25

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Book Review – For One More Day

For One More Day is about Charles “Chick” Benetto, a product of a divorce, forced to choose between his mom and dad. His thirst for his father’s love leads him to baseball where he has a very short, very successful stint before getting injured, falling into a deep depression, surrendering to alcoholism and, eventually, attempting to end his life. Within the attempt, he enters the space between life and death where he spends one more day with his deceased mother and gets the chance to tie up loose ends and make wrongs right before living to tell about his experience.

Book 22 was one I snatched up at a little free library simply because I knew the author was at least decent. I generally follow a typical reading schedule between Book of the Month and book club, and I wasn’t planning on reading this one at this point, but I needed a quick read to fill in some space while waiting on the arrival of a book. So I grabbed this 200 pager off my shelf and devoured it in two days.

Book 22:
For One More Day
by Mitch Albom

Genre:
Fiction

Published:
September 2006

Synopsis According to Mandi:
Without spoilers, For One More Day is about Charles “Chick” Benetto, a product of a divorce, forced to choose between his mom and dad. His thirst for his father’s love leads him to baseball where he has a very short, very successful stint before getting injured, falling into a deep depression, surrendering to alcoholism and, eventually, attempting to end his life. Within the attempt, he enters the space between life and death where he spends one more day with his deceased mother and gets the chance to tie up loose ends and make wrongs right before living to tell about his experience.

Favorite Quote(s):

“But there’s a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking. But behind all your stories is always your mother’s story, because hers is where yours begin.” 

-Mitch Albom, For One More Day

Awards (based upon my brief research):
New York Times Best Seller

Pages:
197

My Overall Rating:
4 – This book was a surprise to me. I’d read Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie (which I gave a 3), and expected this book to be similar. In so many ways, it was, and in so many ways, it wasn’t. I don’t understand Albom’s fascination with the dying, but I really appreciated what he drew from Chick’s experience in the story. It was hard and heart-warming at the same time, and the ending was not at all what I expected.

An Overabundance of Gold

People call breastmilk liquid gold, and I was blessed with an overabundance of it, but there are significant problems with a body that produces 8-14 ounces of breastmilk every 3-4 hours. There are especially significant problems when the baby who’s supposed to be taking that breastmilk is only taking less than 1 ounce at a time.

7.26.17

“It still doesn’t feel like this is actually happening. It feels like I’ll wake up one day and be 8 months pregnant and doing my normal life… For all the fear, panic, pain and frustration we’ve experienced, even this current, less-than-ideal situation is worth it.”

We were still riding Rollercoaster One, the breathing battle, when Oaklee was four weeks old, but we were simultaneously taking our seats and getting strapped in on Rollercoaster Two, the feeding battle.

Oaklee was taking less than one ounce of breastmilk every 3 hours through an orogastric tube (OG tube). On the 25th, she switched from compressed feedings (feedings at a specific rate to give her body a chance to slowly get the food down and digested) to the classic gavage style feedings (still through an OG tube, but feedings that progress at the rate at which gravity allows). Her feeding tube was orogastric as opposed to nasogastric (NG tube – the preferred way) because her nose was covered by her CPAP.

We needed Oaklee to breathe on her own so she could make progress with feedings. Bottle and breastfeeding were off limits, so long as she needed the CPAP. In other words, we couldn’t actually ride both rollercoasters at once. This meant pumping for mommy – a lot of pumping, which caused a lot of overproduction.

8 times a day, Oaklee was receiving less than 1 ounce of breastmilk. 7-8 times a day, mommy was pumping 8-14 ounces and dutifully bottling it up, labeling it with Oaklee’s medical record number and dropping it off at the nutrition room at the hospital.

The nutrition room eventually called our nurse and asked us to stop by on our way out to take some frozen milk home. They suggested I freeze at home what is pumped at home and leave at the hospital what is pumped at the hospital. We’d just bought a deep freezer, and I’d already filled it almost half full of breastmilk alone.

People call breastmilk liquid gold, and I was blessed with an overabundance of it, but there are significant problems with a body that produces 8-14 ounces of breastmilk every 3-4 hours. There are especially significant problems when the baby who’s supposed to be taking that breastmilk is only taking less than 1 ounce at a time.

I was at the front end of realizing the significant problems. I was happy to be building such a great frozen stash, but I was in pain if I didn’t get to my breast pump in time. Still, this was the tolerable stage of our breastfeeding journey that would end up defining so much of the last quarter of 2017.

Quarter one: good pregnancy. Quarter two: bad pregnancy. Quarter three: NICU.

Oscillator –> Ventilator –> CPAP –> Feeder Grower –> CPAP

In the stats:
Birth weight: 2lb, 12oz
Last known weight: 3lb 9oz (7/26/17)
Gestational Age: 31 weeks, 4 days
Days in the hospital: 28
Sets of visitors to see Oaklee: 26
Days on High Frequency Oscillator: 2
Days on Ventilator: 1
Days on CPAP: 21

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Pretty Important Gifts

In the baby shower process, I learned this:

There are a lot of things you need. There are a lot of things you don’t need. When you’re in our situation – one that’s abnormal, stressful and unideal – you need the thoughtful, special gifts just as much as the practical ones. Love is never superfluous, and when a thoughtful, special gift embodies love, that’s a pretty important thing.

7.23.17

“The nursery is really coming along. I still feel like there’s a lot to do, but we’re a lot farther now than we were when I was in the hospital.”

I’d always imagined I would be big and pregnant and unpacking my new baby things from my baby showers/setting up our nursery with great anticipation of the baby to come. For the one baby shower I had while still pregnant, I was at least pregnant – not big, and not unpacking baby things. After Oaklee was born, I had three showers to go. She wasn’t home so I wouldn’t be using the things I’d be getting anyway, but it felt so good to finally feel at least a little bit prepared.

Babies require a lot of stuff. My husband and I tried to take a more minimalist approach, registering for things we needed over things we wanted. We put a high priority on things like a carseat to get her home, a place for her to sleep, a way for her to eat and diapers. We skipped things like a bumbo, an exersaucer, a swing and toys. For the most part, we didn’t want to deal with the clutter long term, but we also didn’t want to deal with the clutter in our current state. We’d been in survival mode for too long. The idea of opening, setting up, cleaning and storing baby items we may or may not use in the near future was not enticing.

What are the basic things we need? That is all we hoped to get.

On the 22nd, I had my work baby shower and was pleasantly surprised with a great spread of well thought out gifts, each one practical/purposeful or special. I got things like our high chair and our umbrella stroller, and then things like Oaklee’s soft, flamingo printed lovie and a wooden “O” for her nursery. I felt so blessed and so much more ready for when Oaklee would come home some day.

On the 23rd, I had a little friends/family shower. Most of the gifts at this one were either incredibly practical or incredibly special. I got a tote full of diapers and burp cloths. And then I got what would one day become Oaklee’s very first baby doll. Again, I felt so blessed.

We had one shower to go, on the 25th, thrown by our small group, where we’d receive our carseat and books – a necessity and something special.

In the baby shower process, I learned this:

There are a lot of things you need. There are a lot of things you don’t need. When you’re in our situation – one that’s abnormal, stressful and unideal – you need the thoughtful, special gifts just as much as the practical ones. Love is never superfluous, and when a thoughtful, special gift embodies love, that’s a pretty important thing.

I hope this experience has even made me a better gift-giver.

Oscillator –> Ventilator –> CPAP –> Feeder Grower –> CPAP

In the stats:
Birth weight: 2lb, 12oz
Last known weight: 3lb 5oz (7/22/17)
Gestational Age: 31 weeks, 1 day
Days in the hospital: 25
Sets of visitors to see Oaklee: 25
Days on High Frequency Oscillator: 2
Days on Ventilator: 1
Days on CPAP: 18

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The Blur

Three weeks postpartum and our lives are kind of a blur. When I try to recount these days, even referencing my journal, it’s majorly statistics – statistics that most normal parents don’t monitor quite so closely – that I remember. Oaklee weighed this much. Oaklee eats this much. Oaklee’s been on the CPAP this many days…

We’d begun to find our groove in the track no one wants to take, navigating yet another long term hospital stay. We were getting through each day simply to get through each day. Our constants were work, hospital, home and pumping. 

7.20.17

“What I can’t wait for is taking Oaklee on walks with me… that day will be so nice when it comes.”

Three weeks postpartum and our lives are kind of a blur. When I try to recount these days, even referencing my journal, it’s majorly statistics – statistics that most normal parents don’t monitor quite so closely – that I remember. Oaklee weighed this much. Oaklee eats this much. Oaklee’s been on the CPAP this many days…

We’d begun to find our groove in the track no one wants to take, navigating yet another long term hospital stay. We were getting through each day simply to get through each day. Our constants were work, hospital, home and pumping.

I changed my work schedule so I was working half of my part time hours of one of the two part time jobs I’d had before Oaklee. 12 hours – 4 days, 3 hours each morning.

After work, I’d go home, eat lunch and either head up to the hospital or run as many errands as possible before heading up to the hospital with Kevin after he got out of work. There was no down time. I’d spend my “free time” prepping three or four meals that we could pack up and take to the hospital, working on putting together our nursery or running our usual errands. How I longed to even just take the time to go for a walk.

Amongst the running around, I was pumping for 15 minutes every three hours and washing pump parts every. single. time. I loathed washing pump parts. I’d get up in the middle of the night to pump the milk for the baby I could not breastfeed, the one who was not even at my house, and wash my pump parts at 2:00am. It was a tether in a time I couldn’t afford to be tied down because I needed to be in three places at once.

Every minute not spent at the hospital was packed full of as much purpose as possible so we could spend as many minutes as possible at the hospital.

We were numb, shut down, single-minded.

I often get asked how people treated us during this time, but I wonder how I treated people during this time. I was not myself. In every way, I was an extension of my sick daughter. She was the only thing I cared about. She was above my schedule, my relationships with others, even my need to take basic care of myself.

Never have I lived my life more on the go, more determined to get through each day, more bull-headed than I did during this time.

I can’t tell you what was going on outside of Area 11 of the NICU in July of 2017 – if there was breaking news or inclement weather – but I can tell you exactly how many milliliters of breastmilk Oaklee was taking.

Oscillator –> Ventilator –> CPAP –> Feeder Grower –> CPAP

In the stats:
Birth weight: 2lb, 12oz
Last known weight: 2lb 13oz (7/15/17)
Gestational Age: 30 weeks, 5 days
Days in the hospital: 22
Sets of visitors to see Oaklee: 20
Days on High Frequency Oscillator: 2
Days on Ventilator: 1
Days on CPAP: 15

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Book Review – Still Me

You can’t read two books in a trilogy and not the third, so this next book was a search for closure for me. Jojo Moyes captivated me, like many others, with Me Before You. I gave it a 4.5 and was so excited when book two, After You, came out, but disappointed once I read it. It wasn’t going to get better than Me Before You, and I should have known that, but still, I needed to see Louisa Clark’s story out to the end, so I landed here for book 21.

You can’t read two books in a trilogy and not the third, so this next book was a search for closure for me. Jojo Moyes captivated me, like many others, with Me Before You. I gave it a 4.5 and was so excited when book two, After You, came out, but disappointed once I read it. It wasn’t going to get better than Me Before You, and I should have known that, but still, I needed to see Louisa Clark’s story out to the end, so I landed here for book 21.

Book 21:
Still Me
by Jojo Moyes

Genre:
Romance, Domestic Fiction, Rom Com

Published:
January 2018

Synopsis According to Mandi:
Without spoilers, Still Me is the third book in the Me Before You trilogy. Lousia’s taken a job in New York City and determined to find adventure and find herself, making the most out of each experience that comes her way. Along the way, she’s faced with choices, challenges and changes to her plans that force her to explore who she is and what she wants out of life even more than she’d anticipated.

Favorite Quote(s):

“Books are what teach you about life. Books teach you empathy. But you can’t buy books if you barely got enough to make rent. So that library is a vital resource! You shut a library, Louisa, you don’t just shut down a building, you shut down hope.” 

-Jojo Moyes, Still Me

Awards (based upon my brief research):
None yet.

Pages:
390

My Overall Rating:
3 – What I loved about this book was the closure it brought to Louisa’s story. I felt she didn’t have to compromise who she was to live the life she wanted to live, and I think that’s an excellent message to send to readers (though I question whether other characters were compromising who they were to live the life they live). However, as a whole, I didn’t think this book was any more spectacular than the average rom com/chick lit read. It’s worth the read, but it won’t blow your socks off. You probably won’t cry or hug the book at the end… Do other people do that?

Rollercoaster One

Were we disappointed in a step back? Of course, but we also just wanted our baby to rest. A baby’s overall development depends so much on his/her sleep. In order for Oaklee to sleep well, she needed to not have to work so hard to breathe. Accepting this step back was like giving our daughter a break, telling her to just relax – she has time to get better. 

7.13.17

“She’s just working too hard to breathe and burning too many calories… On the CPAP, she can relax and sleep soundly.”

We were told the NICU journey will be like a rollercoaster. It’ll have its ups and downs. Your baby will take two steps forward and take one back.

But up until the 12th, Oaklee had only taken steps forward. She’d only gone up.

Oaklee started in such a critical place that she couldn’t afford to take steps back. Taking steps back would have meant her life was on the line again. While many babies in the NICU do dance on that line time and time again, we were incredibly fortunate to have gotten this far before taking a step back.

Oaklee returned to the CPAP. Many parents fret over a CPAP, but we’d seen the darker part of the dark side – a CPAP was nothing. When Oaklee returned to it, we sighed and said, “Well, we had to go backward eventually, right?”

She’d proven she could breathe on her own. Her lungs were capable, but they were working harder than she could afford, burning excessive calories and limiting the Grower part of our Feeder Grower. More than she needed to feed and grow, she needed to rest and relax.

It’s like running a marathon you trained a week for, being premature. You could do it well in fits and starts. You could get to the finish line. You might need assistance here and there. But the most efficient way to do it might just be to take it slowly, allowing your body the opportunity to accomplish such a feat without destroying itself.

Were we disappointed in a step back? Of course, but we also just wanted our baby to rest. A baby’s overall development depends so much on his/her sleep. In order for Oaklee to sleep well, she needed to not have to work so hard to breathe. Accepting this step back was like giving our daughter a break, telling her to just relax – she has time to get better.

Oscillator –> Ventilator –> CPAP –> Feeder Grower –> CPAP

In the stats:
Birth weight: 2lb, 12 oz
Last known weight: 2lb 7 oz (7/3/17)
Gestational Age: 29 weeks, 5 days
Days in the hospital: 15
Sets of visitors to see Oaklee: 16
Days on High Frequency Oscillator: 2
Days on Ventilator: 1
Days on CPAP: 8

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Be good. We love you.

It was somewhere around this date, in the hype of the medical jargon and the chaos of me going back to work, that I realized I needed to tell Oaklee I loved her. While, in so many ways, the doctors and nurses owned Oaklee, being able to provide better care for her than I could, I provided one very important thing they could never provide. Love. 

7.10.17

“Aside from the feeding tube and the sensors, Oaklee just looks like the cutest little baby. We’re beyond smitten with her. She makes it really hard to leave each night.”

On the 8th, at just 9 days old, we got the news that Oaklee no longer required the assistance of the CPAP. She was continuing her onward and upward journey. While this was, of course, significant in her overall health progress, it was also significant because it meant we could finally see her adorable face. The only thing obstructing our view, at this point, was her feeding tube and the occasional phototherapy eye protection.

In addition to being off the CPAP,

  • Oaklee’s PDA (Patent Ductus Arteriosis) had closed on its own by the 3rd.
  • Her second brain scan came back clear, so there was no longer the threat of intraventricular hemorrhage (brain bleeds).
  • Her pneumothorax, the pocket of air in her chest outside of her lungs, was shown to have resolved on its own in her chest x-ray on the 10th.

She was essentially what’s called a “feeder grower” at this point, a baby that is only in the NICU to learn to feed and get her weight up and has no other medical concerns. Less than two weeks ago, we thought we were losing her. Now all she needed to do was learn how to eat and gain some weight.*

Oaklee, having been off TPN and lipids since the 4th, was receiving about 25 milliliters (less than one ounce) of breastmilk at each feeding. This was combined with Prolacta, a specialty nutritional formulation made exclusively from human milk for critically ill premature infants in the NICU to provide a higher caloric/vitamin/mineral/protein intake. She received this every three hours, but each feeding was compressed through a syringe of sorts over the course of two hours in order to give her newly digesting body the opportunity to digest slowly.

It was somewhere around this date, in the hype of the medical jargon and the chaos of me going back to work, that I realized I needed to tell Oaklee I loved her. While, in so many ways, the doctors and nurses owned Oaklee, being able to provide better care for her than I could, I provided one very important thing they could never provide. Love.

I remember feeling foolish the first time I whispered those three words to the baby who didn’t even feel like mine. I said, “I love you,” and then I turned around, left the room, and left my most fragile, most prized possession in the care of people I didn’t even know.

And then I remember feeling foolish for feeling foolish. That is my child. I will never allow her to question my love for her.

So every night, from that point on, my husband and I would wait until any guests left to have a moment, just the three of us. He and I would stand on each side of Oaklee’s isolette, our sanitized hands reaching through the holes to hold her hand or contain her, and we’d tell her to be good and that we loved her. And then we’d turn around, say goodbye to the nurses, walk the long halls of the hospital to the parking garage, get in our car(s) and drive home.

Our lives were a mess, but that didn’t change how much we loved her.

Oscillator –> Ventilator –> CPAP –> Feeder Grower

Onward and upward once more.

In the stats:
Birth weight: 2lb, 12 oz
Last known weight: 2lb 7 oz (7/3/17)
Gestational Age: 29 weeks, 2 days
Days in the hospital: 12
Sets of visitors to see Oaklee: 13
Days on High Frequency Oscillator: 2
Days on Ventilator: 1
Days on CPAP: 6

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P.S. I mentioned all Oaklee needed to do was learn how to eat and gain some weight. There were, however, other issues still at hand, though they may not have been issues that would have kept us at the NICU had she weighed a tad more than under 3lbs.

  • Oaklee was still, on and off, receiving phototherapy under a bililight for jaundice – an indication that her liver was not working properly – which, again, is extremely common in preemies.
  • Her PFO (patent foram ovale – a hole in her heart) had still not closed, but 1 in 4 people live with this condition their entire lives, many without even knowing it.
  • Regardless of being CPAP-less, she was still receiving caffeine citrate for treatment of apnea of prematurity. Preemies will sometimes literally forget to breathe regardless of knowing how to breathe. In order to come home, she was going to need to prove she could go an extensive amount of time without caffeine. They would not pull the caffeine until her oxygen saturations and respiratory rates were satisfactory enough for them to believe she was not going to forget to breathe.

Book Review – Calypso

This next one was my June Book of the Month choice and, fun fact, it was also my 100th book since I got married in September of 2014. (I celebrated by buying a book today.) I’m drawn to memoirs and needed a light read after the last couple of topics I was getting stuck on and this one delivered.

This next one was my June Book of the Month choice and, fun fact, it was also my 100th book since I got married in September of 2014. (I celebrated by buying a book today.) I’m drawn to memoirs and needed a light read after the last couple of topics I was getting stuck on and this one delivered.

Book 20:
Calypso
by David Sedaris

Genre:
Humour, Memoir

Published:
May 2018

Synopsis According to Mandi:
Without spoilers, Calypso is a collection of true stories about being middle aged, mortality, beach houses and the Sedaris family. David gives the reader a peak into the humor he finds in his every day life. He shares his story with great humility despite the very obvious wealth he’s found himself in.

Favorite Quote(s):

“‘What are you doing?’ Hugh moaned as I stepped out of the dressing room. ‘That’s three pairs of culottes you’ll own now.’ All I could say in my defense was ‘Maybe I have a busy life.’” 

-David Sedaris, Calypso

Awards (based upon my brief research):
None yet.

Pages:
259

My Overall Rating:
3.5 – As a memoir, I would give this a three. As a humor book, I would give it a 4. I literally laughed out loud in some parts. I really respect Sedaris for maintaining such humility even though he’s very clearly very wealthy. I enjoyed reading about his lifestyle both at his home in Sussex and at his vacation home in North Carolina. It was fun to dream of owning either home and to learn about how he uses his spaces.

This book won’t move mountains, but it is a perfect summer read.

Book Review – Sing, Unburied, Sing

Sing, Unburied, Sing is about the struggle to navigate rites of passage amidst varying family and racial dynamics. Jojo, age 13, is becoming a man as his black grandfather helps raise him, his white father is released from prison, his white grandfather refuses to acknowledge his existence and the spirits of important deceased men pay him visits. Meanwhile, his black mom can’t seem to put her children above her drug addiction, his black grandmother is dying of cancer and he’s forced to take care of his little sister, Kayla. It’s a story of generational poverty wrapped up in a time when racial tensions still ran strong in Mississippi.

This next book was nabbed at a library used book sale for $1. Why it was being sold, I will never understand, for it’s won countless awards and praises have been highly sung for it. When sifting through used books, I generally look for books I’ve heard of and books that were published either recently or would be considered classics. I suspect this one, which was published recently, will one day be considered a classic as well. 

Book 19:
Sing, Unburied, Sing
by Jesmyn Ward

Genre:
Road Fiction, Thriller, Suspense, Coming-of-Age Fiction, Literary fiction

Published:
September 2017

Synopsis According to Mandi:
Without spoilers, Sing, Unburied, Sing is about the struggle to navigate rites of passage amidst varying family and racial dynamics. Jojo, age 13, is becoming a man as his black grandfather helps raise him, his white father is released from prison, his white grandfather refuses to acknowledge his existence and the spirits of important deceased men pay him visits. Meanwhile, his black mom can’t seem to put her children above her drug addiction, his black grandmother is dying of cancer and he’s forced to take care of his little sister, Kayla. It’s a story of generational poverty wrapped up in a time when racial tensions still ran strong in Mississippi.

Favorite Quote(s):

Sometimes the world don’t give you what you need, no matter how hard you look. Sometimes it withholds.” 

-Jesmyn Ward, Sing, Unburied, Sing

Awards (based upon my brief research):
National Book Award for Fiction
A TIME magazine Best Novel of the Year
New York Times top 10 of 2017
Finalist for the Kirkus Prize
Finalist for the Andrew Carnegie Medal
Finalist for the Aspen Words Literary Prize
Publishers Weekly Top 10 of 2017
Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award
One of President Obama’s best books read of 2017
Finalist for the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work, Fiction
Finalist for the Goodreads Choice Awards Best Fiction
Finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction

Pages:
285

My Overall Rating:
3 – I wanted to like this book more, but I can also see why it’s won so many awards. The story very well demonstrates themes of generational poverty and racial tension, but it took me so long to get into the meat of the story that I struggled to want to read it. I really liked that the white male character was the one who was incarcerated. I think that was a strong sign of equality amidst a story of perceived inequality. Otherwise, I would give the first half of the book a 2 and the second half of the book a 4, hence the 3.