Jaundice Woes
At this point in my short relationship with Luke I've come to realize two things: 1) I love him more than I ever believed was possible to love another human being and 2) That he has been a little bit of drama from the get go. The entire pregnancy has been laced with drama at every turn and I had hoped that after he was here, that would be the end of it. lol little did I know how wrong that idea was. He seems to thrive on a little bit of drama. Not enough to make things really bad, but enough to cause a commotion.
I feel like I had a really good delivery. When i think back on it, i remember just KNOWING that I could push this kid out once i started the whole pushing process. In fact several songs were playing through my head during this time. I don't remember them at all except for this one. It was already a special song for me anyways and the day that I found out we were having a BOY and not a girl, I remember standing at the checkout desk at the Dr. office and this song came on the overhead radio in the Dr. office. I listened to it repeatedly that week. So when it got down to the end and I was told by my Dr. that I only had a few pushes left until he was out, this song popped into my head. It's my unofficial song to Luke.
That being said, once he was delivered we weren't really in the hospital that long and we went home early the next day. I was so nervous to be going home with my baby boy!
But we seemed to have settled in ok. He was a champ at breastfeeding from the get go and I felt like even though it was painful, we were doing ok. He was circumcised the day we left the hospital and consequently he was awake for a long time after we got home and wasn't fussy and I was only feeding him every 4 hours. I didn't know that I should be feeding him more because he wasn't acting hungry. Some friends came by to meet him and my friend Laura said "he looks a little jaundiced". We had only been home for like 6 hours or so. I didn't really think much about it because we were in a dark room with a lamp on and I thought maybe that was why. The next day was Sunday and we had only been home for 24 hours and Richie had noticed that the whites of his eyes were yellow. So i called my pediatrician and she told me to keep feeding him and to supplement with some formula. She also said to come in first thing in the AM to the office so that they could check his Bilirubin levels.
I took this picture that night. Looking at it now, I don't know how i didn't see his jaundice earlier. He's clearly yellow. I cried some tears because I thought it was my fault that I wasn't feeding him enough and that I didn't notice it - Richie noticed it. Hormones are crazy things!!!
When we went to the Dr. he confirmed the Jaundice - duh doesn't take a genius to notice it. They drew blood from his heel - which again caused me to cry. Poor guy! Then we went home and the Dr. said he would call later that afternoon with the results. When he called a few hours later and told us he was very concerned because his number was 19.4 and that we needed to go straight to the hospital, my heart just sank. I just thought "here we go again! When does this drama stop?" We had only been home less than 48 hours!
We got to the hospital and they sent us up to NICU where they informed us he would be there a minimum of 48 hours. He spent a large portion of the first 24 hours under huge lights. During this time we couldn't hold him at all unless it was to feed him for 15 minutes.
Richie and I just sat and stared at him for hours. There was no TV in the NICU and you weren't supposed to have your phone out you because of the amount of germs a phone carries. Visitors was discouraged unless it was the parents because it was flu season. I'm not sure how Richie and I sat there for that long doing nothing. The hardest part was leaving him overnight. I stroked his hand and said goodbye and walked out the door crying. But I realized I had forgotten something a few minutes later, so I turned back around and walked back in the room. He was all alone by himself in this room in his incubator and he was crying and no one was coming to help him. I guess the nurse assigned to him was busy with her other baby. IT. BROKE. MY. HEART. I felt like I was leaving him all alone and he knew he was all alone. I wasn't even allowed to comfort his crying. Poor guy.
The next 12 hours, they took him off of the big lights and just gave him a blanket light to lay on. He still had to wear his glasses.
Finally the last 12 hours took him off all of the lights and we were able to hold him!
I feel like I had a really good delivery. When i think back on it, i remember just KNOWING that I could push this kid out once i started the whole pushing process. In fact several songs were playing through my head during this time. I don't remember them at all except for this one. It was already a special song for me anyways and the day that I found out we were having a BOY and not a girl, I remember standing at the checkout desk at the Dr. office and this song came on the overhead radio in the Dr. office. I listened to it repeatedly that week. So when it got down to the end and I was told by my Dr. that I only had a few pushes left until he was out, this song popped into my head. It's my unofficial song to Luke.
That being said, once he was delivered we weren't really in the hospital that long and we went home early the next day. I was so nervous to be going home with my baby boy!
But we seemed to have settled in ok. He was a champ at breastfeeding from the get go and I felt like even though it was painful, we were doing ok. He was circumcised the day we left the hospital and consequently he was awake for a long time after we got home and wasn't fussy and I was only feeding him every 4 hours. I didn't know that I should be feeding him more because he wasn't acting hungry. Some friends came by to meet him and my friend Laura said "he looks a little jaundiced". We had only been home for like 6 hours or so. I didn't really think much about it because we were in a dark room with a lamp on and I thought maybe that was why. The next day was Sunday and we had only been home for 24 hours and Richie had noticed that the whites of his eyes were yellow. So i called my pediatrician and she told me to keep feeding him and to supplement with some formula. She also said to come in first thing in the AM to the office so that they could check his Bilirubin levels.
I took this picture that night. Looking at it now, I don't know how i didn't see his jaundice earlier. He's clearly yellow. I cried some tears because I thought it was my fault that I wasn't feeding him enough and that I didn't notice it - Richie noticed it. Hormones are crazy things!!!
When we went to the Dr. he confirmed the Jaundice - duh doesn't take a genius to notice it. They drew blood from his heel - which again caused me to cry. Poor guy! Then we went home and the Dr. said he would call later that afternoon with the results. When he called a few hours later and told us he was very concerned because his number was 19.4 and that we needed to go straight to the hospital, my heart just sank. I just thought "here we go again! When does this drama stop?" We had only been home less than 48 hours!
We got to the hospital and they sent us up to NICU where they informed us he would be there a minimum of 48 hours. He spent a large portion of the first 24 hours under huge lights. During this time we couldn't hold him at all unless it was to feed him for 15 minutes.
Richie and I just sat and stared at him for hours. There was no TV in the NICU and you weren't supposed to have your phone out you because of the amount of germs a phone carries. Visitors was discouraged unless it was the parents because it was flu season. I'm not sure how Richie and I sat there for that long doing nothing. The hardest part was leaving him overnight. I stroked his hand and said goodbye and walked out the door crying. But I realized I had forgotten something a few minutes later, so I turned back around and walked back in the room. He was all alone by himself in this room in his incubator and he was crying and no one was coming to help him. I guess the nurse assigned to him was busy with her other baby. IT. BROKE. MY. HEART. I felt like I was leaving him all alone and he knew he was all alone. I wasn't even allowed to comfort his crying. Poor guy.
The next 12 hours, they took him off of the big lights and just gave him a blanket light to lay on. He still had to wear his glasses.
It was so tiring being in the hospital. All in all we were there for 54 hours. I knew that he would be fine and that Jaundice was pretty common but i HATED leaving him there overnight. I also didn't like the fact that they had to draw so much blood and prick his heel over and over. Poor guy was hoarse by the time he left the hospital.
So while I knew that his condition was serious, I also knew he would be fine and he would come home. Looking around at some of the babies in the NICU who weighed only a few pounds and had critical illnesses, I thanked God that Luke only had Jaundice.
The other downside was that I was trying to breastfeed him and being in the hospital didn't help that. So while I could pump and bring the milk to him, I couldn't actually breast feed. The few times I actually did, the time was limited and the nurses had to supplement with another ounce or two afterwards. So he got used to the bottle and now has no desire to go back to the breast. He got so used to a bottle and the ease of milk flowing from it, that he gets mad when I try to feed him any other way. It was really frustrating trying to get him to latch on. We spent the first day home trying to get that accomplished but it only made him angry and frustrated and it made me cry. So sadly, I had to give that up too. For now I pump every single time he eats, and Richie gets up every 2-3 hours with me and feeds him while i pump. I am SO INCREDIBLY blessed to have married such an amazing man. It's so sweet watching him with Luke. He kisses him and snuggles him and loves him and says he loves him all the time. He changes diapers, he feeds him and he talks to him all the time. It is so amazing to watch. You think you can't possibly love someone more than you already do, but I've found my heart has grown so much since I became pregnant. It's amazing that it hasn't burst yet!
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