This week’s PhotoFriday Challenge: BABY
“Fragile“
Click image to view full-size version.
I was really struggling on this one, particularly as I currently know of no-one pregnant/with a baby (and what with pregnancy and babies being such personal things, you can’t just go around snapping at strangers)…
The resulting effort is this. It’s somewhat a joint piece of work. The original photograph was taken over 2 decades ago by my father (equipment and technical set-up unknown). This version was then subjected to some digital wizardry on my part.
I hoped that the effects would convey some of the feeling of story behind the photo…
The baby was born at 31 weeks gestation (9 weeks premature of its due date) and is laying in an incubator in a SCBU (Intensive Care Unit for babies).
She was indeed very fragile, having been born prematurely, her lungs had failed to fully develop and she couldn’t breathe without a ventilator for the first week or two of her life. Her ears were simply unformed flaps of skin, her eyes were covered to protect them from the UV lamps she lay under to help treat her jaundice, she was tube-fed for a time and lain in an open nappy as at only 4lb, 3oz (and not much bigger than her cuddly pink bunny that shared her incubator), there wasn’t a nappy small enough to fit…
Although some feared the worst, that baby left the SCBU after a month and (eventually, years later) went on to make this post. 
Awww…
My name is Claire and this is my blog. I live with my Partner and our 2 year old adopted Greyhound, 
This design was inspired by & made with the greatest admiration and respect for the work of the late John Heartfield.
Aww indeed! Beautiful picture — must’ve almost hurt your father to have taken that then.
I was 3lb 2oz when I was born. Weird, considering I’m such a fatass now!
V xx
Yes, I should have imagined it did… There was an awful lot of “hospital” photographs taken, which is kind of sad in a way… Feels weird to think that was me, I can’t really indentify with it at all, it seems so far removed from everything here and now…
3lb 2oz? Wow, that’s tiny…(I assume you were premature too?) I was kind of lucky in that my weight was considered “good” for how prem I was…(And I’m sure you’re not a fatass
)
Yeah, I was eight weeks premature, but I think I had stopped growing properly, which spurred the emergency intervention.
And I *am* a fatass, but it’s self-inflicted!
V xx
Ah, so you must have been born at around 32 weeks (a week later that me) then…but tinier, which explains the emergency intervention…
With me there was no “medical” or health reason for my early arrival, it seems I was just impatient! *rolls eyes*
My sister was also intent on turning up early, but luckily the hospital was aware of my mum’s history and gave my mum the necessary jabs to help my sister develop faster (incase she did turn up before the due date), luckily it was a false alarm though…
(Although now its the running joke that the lung development drugs are responsible for my sis’ big gob, which has earned her the nickname “Fog Horn” — as you can always hear her before you see her!! LOL
)