Naomi’s Story
The day I submitted my first middle-grade novel, “The Lion of Lark- Hayes Manor” for publication, I went into labor with my third child. It felt like such beautiful symmetry: two of my babies making their debuts together. It had to be a sign. I joked with my agent that I wasn’t sure which endeavor had taken more out of me. And though I thought that was the extent of the synchronicity, I soon learned it was just the beginning.
Because three hours later, I gave birth. Naomi was born with paralyzed vocal cords— a rare condition impacting fewer than one in a million babies. We have no explanation for it, no cure, no genetic or gestational component to shed further light. It just is. (read more)
I wrote a book about a girl finding her voice; I gave birth to a girl without one.
The irony felt so deliberate and cruel, for weeks I couldn’t think about it. I nearly pulled my book from submission. One night, beneath the dim lights of the newborn intensive care unit, I watched Naomi breathe to the rhythm of the ventilator. It was the evening before her tracheotomy— a surgery that would give her a stable airway but more fully steal her ability to vocalize. I heard the rumble of the sliding glass door, the squeak of sneakers as a nurse joined me.
I didn’t lift my head. “How can I care for a baby who can’t cry?” I asked.
The response that came will stay with me forever: “You’ll have to change the way you listen.”
I was terrified to bring Naomi home. It would have been so easy to fail her. But I’ll tell you what: Even from another room, my ear can pick up the wheezing sound of her cry. A change in her breathing wakes me from a dead sleep. She is communicative and emotive and brilliant, but she hasn’t magically learned to vocalize. I’ve learned to listen.
There’s a chance my daughter’s vocal cords spontaneously recover some day. Until then, it doesn’t mean she has nothing to say. I think of the final lines from Poppy’s favorite storybook:
“She knows
she makes the world beautiful
when she blooms in her own time.”
-Aubrey Hartman, mom of Naomi and Newbery Honor winning book author. Excerpt taken from Author’s Note in “The Lion of Lark Hayes Manor.”