Never Google!!

By now, Zak was really starting to gather new titles every week, so it seemed. We had been home for a while, and already had a list of problems. His original diagnosis of HIE grade II was one that I never fully understood. I knew what the doctors had told me, which was that HIE is just a medical term meaning Zak had suffered from lack of Oxygen at some time during his delivery, and what that meant for his future, only time would tell. But I needed to know more.
Trawelling through the internet I came across several sites that tried to explain HIE. None of which I fully understood....then I read one. I can't even remember now where it was, but the words shocked me. It suggested that children who suffer HIE in it's 3 stages had a pretty bleak outlook. Grade 1, the children rarely leave hospital...Grade 2, they would have multiple and severe disabilities, with average life expectancy of just 8 years...I didn't read on.
I broke down. My husband was away at work, and it was late at night. There was no one there to set me straight. I called my sister who lives in Germany, hoping she would still be awake with the time difference....she was. I could hardly speak. I had instantly convinced myself that Zak was going to die, and no-one had told me. How could they know this and not tell me!!
My sister somehow managed to calm me down enough to reassure me that what we read on the internet is a generalisation, and that no-one knows what the future has in store...speak to the experts, the people who know Zak, and find out the real facts.
I learned quite quickly to not google too much. Sometimes it is useful, at other times it has the ability to rip out your heart and tear it in to a million peices.
The 'facts' that were of any importance to me about HIE, were quite simply that it is brain damage caused by lack of oxygen during or around delivery. There are certain markers as to the severity, seizures, feeding issues, muscle tone.... anything past that is not important. When it's done, it's done. It doesn't get worse....it just is.