The NICU is not the place you go to meet people. It\u2019s an intensive care unit, not Cheers.<\/p>\n

Chances are, if you\u2019re here, it\u2019s a high-pressure situation. The background noise is beeps and buzzes and the whooshing of air in and out of ventilators. There\u2019s a clicking, too, a \u201ctck, tck, tck\u201d of the feeding pumping, counting down the milliliters of milk and vitamins dripping down tubes and into bellies.<\/p>\n

This is not the soundtrack for small talk.<\/p>\n

And yet, when my son, born prematurely at 30 weeks, was one month into his NICU resort stay and clearly thinking he was on sabbatical and would return shortly to the womb, I met the woman who would become my best friend. I met her on the worst day of my life.<\/p>\n

Brain scans are funny. Dots on black and white and gray delineate good from bad, solid from liquid, tissue from bone. On the day in question, my son had a 30-day brain scan, unbeknownst to us. Apparently, this is standard procedure. (Over the next few months \u2013 how long it took us to graduate \u2013 we would come to learn all the procedures much better than we would have liked.)<\/p>\n

It was a sunny and warm day in April, the kind that makes all the kids in all the classrooms stare out the window and wish for summer. Of course, inside the NICU the weather is irrelevant behind tinted windows and fluorescent lighting. But I carried the mood in with me, a spring breeze along with my pumped milk in its little cooler.<\/p>\n

The nurse in my son\u2019s room was new. They always were. I never could learn them all. She informed me that the head of the NICU would like to see me. She\u2019d page him, she said. And then she looked at me three seconds longer than was normal. That\u2019s how I knew something was up.<\/p>\n

When he entered, the big man himself, he spoke a great many words I did not hear while pointing to gray spots on a picture of my son\u2019s brain. I looked at the scan, and then I looked at my son in my arms, awake and eyeing my like, \u201cYou, hey you, I see that milk there. What\u2019s the hold up, lady?\u201d<\/p>\n

And then I heard the doctor say, \u201cperiventricular leukomalacia.\u201d Eleven syllables to tell me that my child had damage in all four quadrants of his brain. Very gently, I kissed him on his head, which smelled of hand sanitizer, and handed him to the nurse so I wouldn\u2019t drop him. Then I walked out and lost it \u2013 lost all control of my body and words and thoughts. I cried and shook and tore at my clothes a little.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Hours later, I went back in and sat in the hospital-issued rocker and held my son again. We looked at each other. He sized me up with an owlish stare and then stretched and pooped, very casually, like he was The Big Lebowski and I, his bowling buddy. No biggie, man. The nurse laughed from her corner where she\u2019d been charting stats. We got to talking.<\/p>\n

Five years later, this nurse is in my contacts under \u201cfamily.\u201d She has a husband and a house and a dog and a mother, and I\u2019ve seen it all. It sounds weird to refer to your \u201cbest friend\u201d when in your 30s, like you\u2019re one mall trip away from buying matching necklaces at Claire\u2019s. But she is.<\/p>\n

After we came home from the NICU, finally, she called to check in. Nobody actually uses the numbers they swap on the way out the door, but she did. She came over a week later. And she\u2019s been coming over ever since, swapping quips and bringing iced coffee and all the good magazines for the pool. We\u2019ve celebrated birthdays and Thanksgivings and drunk wine at vineyards and made our husbands watch Katherine Hepburn flicks. She\u2019s the one I call when I\u2019m losing my mind over insurance battles with my son\u2019s wheelchair or swim therapy. She\u2019s also the one I call when I watch the newest episode of \u201cGame of Thrones\u201d.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s my person. She\u2019s my best friend. She would roll her eyes at this. This is why we work.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t expect to make new friends at my age. You\u2019ve got your standard go-tos locked in, the ones that don\u2019t require effort. You\u2019ve already dated and wooed them. But I wooed a new one. I met the best friend I\u2019ll ever have on the worst day of my life, which I guess moves it up a notch.<\/p>\n

Who knew your 30s could be your social growth spurt?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*Linking up with Amanda<\/a>. This article originally appeared in Parent.co<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Do you have a best friend? When did you meet?<\/strong><\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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