Getting Ready for My Wedding Day

The wedding plans were in full swing. We had reserved a hall for the reception just in case of rain; I wanted to have the reception in the backyard around the pool. My baby sister was born in May, so my mom, grandfather, and I worked on the gardens and the yard to get it ready. My mom wasn’t able to be at home, for she was staying at the hospital with the baby. Things were starting to look really good. Everything went okay, but my mom had to have a C-section, but all went well. So now we were three months from my wedding day, and I had a baby sister twenty-one years younger than me. Mom felt so bad that she couldn’t help, but she knew we understood.

My baby sister got very sick when she was two months old. The doctor in Southampton took some blood and then gave her a shot of medicine. Then he sent them on their way to a hospital way up the island, close to New York City, ninety miles from us. In about an hour, the doctor came to talk to them. He felt that the doctor in Southampton had made the correct diagnosis, and the fact that he gave her the shot that he did was going to be a great help. They were told that she was being moved upstairs, and they could see her soon. He told them to go to the fifth floor and wait for her there. When they got to the fifth floor and told the nurse who they were, she took them right to the room where they would be bringing her. It wasn’t long before they brought her in. She had two IVs in her head; they told them that was the only place they could find a good vein being, she was so young.

After a little while, a doctor came in to talk to them. He told them it was very serious, and there could be some major problems or nothing at all. Then he told them the fact that their pediatrician had done the right thing by giving her the shot he did. But they would have to wait until the blood test came back just to be sure based on the blood he drew. So the next day, the test came back that she did have a major illness, and she was being treated for it already.

At the time, there was a gas shortage, and you could only get gas on even or odd days, based on the number on your license plate, and you could only get eight gallons at a time. Again, Shelter Island, being what it was, the owner of the gas station told us to pick a car that was going to be used to go back and forth to the hospital, and that car would get filled every day. My mom and dad were staying at a friend’s house up by the hospital, but one of us went up every day to help them through this time. My car became the one that was going to be used, so every time we went to the local gas station, they would fill the tank. My sister and I took turns going up to the hospital, so my dad knew someone would be coming up to be with Mom. Being so close to the city, he went to work like normal. Then he would come back after work, and Mom and Dad would go get something to eat before whoever was there went back home. I told my mom that I would postpone the wedding, and my mom said no way. “It will work out, don’t worry,” she told me. Well, I didn’t know if my mom was going to be at my wedding. It was hard not knowing, but we kept the plans in motion. My wedding day was getting close, and my baby sister was still in the hospital. I was going nuts. I wanted them to be home, but I knew Mom and Dad would have to stay with her until she came home.

My wedding was one week away, and Mom and the baby were still in the hospital, but she was doing a lot better. The doctors thought she would be going home soon; they were just waiting for the final blood test to come back. The Monday before the wedding, the doctor came in and told my parents that they could take her home. This is when they told her about what the side effect could be: she could have brain damage or nothing at all. They felt that because she had gotten the shot right away—it should help her—but they would have to wait and see. The only side effect from the medicine she was on would be that her baby teeth might be weak, and she would have early decay. But being so young, it might just be her baby teeth that would be affected. They told us they couldn’t know if her adult teeth had started to form, and if so, they might have a lot of problems also. But it ended up that her adult teeth were okay.

When they were getting ready to leave the hospital, my mom told the doctor that her daughter was getting married on Saturday and asked if the baby should be there or not. He said, “No, she shouldn’t be around too many people right away because her immune system might be low. But she could come to the house and be in the wedding photos, but don’t take her where the reception is being held.” Mom called to let us know they were coming home, for she knew I was waiting for that phone call. Then my mom told me that the baby couldn’t be at the wedding, but she could come for a short time to be in the pictures. I told my mom I didn’t care about that; I was just glad they were coming home.