Babies Bork
Thursday, October 11, 2012
First Outing as a Family of Four
Last Saturday we loaded up the car and headed to Willies for lunch. The outing was a success. Mom and Dad enjoyed getting out of the house and Kaitlyn had some fun. Hailey got some good zzz's in.
Hospital Pictures
So long overdue - what can I say, we've been busy! But here are the pictures from the hospital. This is my first meeting with Miss Hailey right before they took her from the delivery room and to the NICU.
8 lbs, 12 oz - a big girl. The doctor was right!
Here they are cleaning her up in the delivery room. She was wailing!
Here was her home in the NICU.
They brought me to see her on my way from recovery to our postpartum room. It was tough because I was pretty immobile. The spinal was still in effect and I was pretty wiped out. So I really could just lay there and look at her.
On Saturday, they brought her to our room. Poor girl's cheeks were super red from all the tape. She kept pulling it off - we have a feisty one!
Proud poppa!
Grandpa Aitken getting his hands on Hailey for the first time
Snug as a bug in a rug!
Momma and Hailey
Grandma holding Hailey
Here we are all dressed to go home on Sunday! This outfit is adorable and was a big hit with the nurses. It was a gift from my coworkers. The hat was too cute!
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
The rest of our hospital stay
At 4 am on Saturday morning, they took off my IV and took out my catheter. At that point, I had Eric wheeled me down in a wheelchair to see her. She was sleeping like a sweet angel, so we just peaked at her for a little while.
Around 10 am the doctor called us with an update. Hailey had an elevated white blood cell count based on her bloodwork but the specific tests they had done to pinpoint a source had all come back negative. He said that she had a pretty significant heart murmur that hadn't shown up previously. They wanted to do an echo to check on that. That was a little scary.
Around 2:30 pm we were getting ready to head over to see her when they called and said we were going to get to have her in our room for an hour. That ended up being the first time either of us held her! We worked on breast feeding and just loved on her. They took her back to the NICU to wait on the doctor to read her echo results.
At 5:30 there was a knock at the door - surprise! She was going to get to "room in" with us for the night. The nurse let us know the echo results were good. The blood work was still showing elevated white blood cells. The levels were pretty consistent with the day before. At that point the were trying to determine if she would need antibiotics. (Antibiotics would earn her a multiple day stay to have an IV).
Apparently the heart murmur is a common newborn condition. They said she had a small PDA/PFO. Patent ductus arteriosus is when there is abnormal blood flow between 2 major arteries. It typically closes within a few days of birth. Patent foramen ovals is a hole between the two atriums.
The evening went pretty well. She was picking up breast feeding pretty well. Sometimes she would get impatient but all in all we were having some success. It was really great to have her with us.
On Sunday morning they let us know that we were going to get to go home but that the doctor wanted to see her one more time. They ended up repeating the chest X-ray (did one on day 1 to see if there was fluid in the lungs). This time they found a pocket of air outside the lungs which he said was a possible pneumothorax. So our plans to go home were postponed. They repeated the chest X-ray. This time they focused on the area where they saw the pneumothorax. This time the X-ray was clear but her pulse ox was abnormal. So more hours of waiting - lots of ups and downs. In the end, they repeated the pulse ox and got better results so cleared us for discharge.
We left the hospital around 6 pm on Sunday night. We couldn't wait to get back to the comforts of home!
I will post pictures soon!
Around 10 am the doctor called us with an update. Hailey had an elevated white blood cell count based on her bloodwork but the specific tests they had done to pinpoint a source had all come back negative. He said that she had a pretty significant heart murmur that hadn't shown up previously. They wanted to do an echo to check on that. That was a little scary.
Around 2:30 pm we were getting ready to head over to see her when they called and said we were going to get to have her in our room for an hour. That ended up being the first time either of us held her! We worked on breast feeding and just loved on her. They took her back to the NICU to wait on the doctor to read her echo results.
At 5:30 there was a knock at the door - surprise! She was going to get to "room in" with us for the night. The nurse let us know the echo results were good. The blood work was still showing elevated white blood cells. The levels were pretty consistent with the day before. At that point the were trying to determine if she would need antibiotics. (Antibiotics would earn her a multiple day stay to have an IV).
Apparently the heart murmur is a common newborn condition. They said she had a small PDA/PFO. Patent ductus arteriosus is when there is abnormal blood flow between 2 major arteries. It typically closes within a few days of birth. Patent foramen ovals is a hole between the two atriums.
The evening went pretty well. She was picking up breast feeding pretty well. Sometimes she would get impatient but all in all we were having some success. It was really great to have her with us.
On Sunday morning they let us know that we were going to get to go home but that the doctor wanted to see her one more time. They ended up repeating the chest X-ray (did one on day 1 to see if there was fluid in the lungs). This time they found a pocket of air outside the lungs which he said was a possible pneumothorax. So our plans to go home were postponed. They repeated the chest X-ray. This time they focused on the area where they saw the pneumothorax. This time the X-ray was clear but her pulse ox was abnormal. So more hours of waiting - lots of ups and downs. In the end, they repeated the pulse ox and got better results so cleared us for discharge.
We left the hospital around 6 pm on Sunday night. We couldn't wait to get back to the comforts of home!
I will post pictures soon!
Friday, September 28, 2012
Hailey Joyce Aitken
What a birth day! Hailey was born Friday morning at 10:54 am. We woke up at our normal time so we could get Kaitlyn to school. Then we headed over to the hospital. We were supposed to be there at 9:00. They got us checked in and I was hooked up with an IV for fluids.
At around 9:45 the nurse came in and said the doctor wanted to go early. So they prepped me as soon as possible and we headed back to the operating room. This time I had to walk myself in the room. I wasn't a big fan of this because I had to look at my surroundings. With Kaitlyn I kept my eyes shut the whole time. They got me up on the table and the anesthesiologist administered my spinal. This wasn't as bad as getting the epidural but it still pinched and burned and gave me the heebie-jeebies.
Once they had me laying down they started prepping the area and I started to feel bad. I was tingly and hot and kind of felt like I was going to pass out. They took some of the covers off of me and began to fan my face. I think the anesthesiologist made an adjustment and I found out later that my blood pressure had dropped pretty low. But I started to feel better pretty fast after that.
Once I was ready, Eric came in the room. It seemed like it took them longer to get Hailey out than Kaitlyn. The person assisting my doctor was a very large man and he had to push and pull and grunt to get her out! And as was predicted, she was a big baby - 8 lbs. 12 oz (91 - 96 percentile). That is almost a full pound bigger than Kaitlyn was and she was an inch shorter than Kaitlyn at 20 inches (51 - 75 percentile). Her head was in the 76 - 90 percentile at 35.5 cm!
Once they started working on Hailey to get her cleaned up it became apparent to me pretty quickly that all was not perfect. You could tell there wasn't any emergency, but they weren't totally pleased with the what they were seeing. They wanted to see an oxygen saturation in the low 90's or above but it was in the high 80's. They put her on a CPAP and called the neonatologist to come look at her. He decided they needed to bring her to the NICU to manage and observe the respiratory distress. She was breathing really fast (transient tachypnea). I was okay with this and had almost prepared myself going into the birth that this would be the outcome. He said that was a common problem with Csections. Since the baby didn't come through the birth canal, the liquid didn't all get squeezed out of her lungs. On the bright side her one minute Apgar was an 8 and her five-minute Apgar was a 9.
Afterwards they sent me to recovery and to wait on a room. They were full again but luckily I was able to get one of the nice rooms. When they transported me from recovery to my postpartum room, we stopped by the NICU to see Hailey. She didn't have too many wires. Just an IV and a nasal cannula for oxygen. Needless to say I was a bit emotional at this point since it all was too familiar.
They got me pumping right away and the lactation specialist was pleasantly surprised at my output. We were hoping to get some good sleep that night. Unfortunately we were right by the nurses station and man were they noisy!
To be continued...
At around 9:45 the nurse came in and said the doctor wanted to go early. So they prepped me as soon as possible and we headed back to the operating room. This time I had to walk myself in the room. I wasn't a big fan of this because I had to look at my surroundings. With Kaitlyn I kept my eyes shut the whole time. They got me up on the table and the anesthesiologist administered my spinal. This wasn't as bad as getting the epidural but it still pinched and burned and gave me the heebie-jeebies.
Once they had me laying down they started prepping the area and I started to feel bad. I was tingly and hot and kind of felt like I was going to pass out. They took some of the covers off of me and began to fan my face. I think the anesthesiologist made an adjustment and I found out later that my blood pressure had dropped pretty low. But I started to feel better pretty fast after that.
Once I was ready, Eric came in the room. It seemed like it took them longer to get Hailey out than Kaitlyn. The person assisting my doctor was a very large man and he had to push and pull and grunt to get her out! And as was predicted, she was a big baby - 8 lbs. 12 oz (91 - 96 percentile). That is almost a full pound bigger than Kaitlyn was and she was an inch shorter than Kaitlyn at 20 inches (51 - 75 percentile). Her head was in the 76 - 90 percentile at 35.5 cm!
Once they started working on Hailey to get her cleaned up it became apparent to me pretty quickly that all was not perfect. You could tell there wasn't any emergency, but they weren't totally pleased with the what they were seeing. They wanted to see an oxygen saturation in the low 90's or above but it was in the high 80's. They put her on a CPAP and called the neonatologist to come look at her. He decided they needed to bring her to the NICU to manage and observe the respiratory distress. She was breathing really fast (transient tachypnea). I was okay with this and had almost prepared myself going into the birth that this would be the outcome. He said that was a common problem with Csections. Since the baby didn't come through the birth canal, the liquid didn't all get squeezed out of her lungs. On the bright side her one minute Apgar was an 8 and her five-minute Apgar was a 9.
Afterwards they sent me to recovery and to wait on a room. They were full again but luckily I was able to get one of the nice rooms. When they transported me from recovery to my postpartum room, we stopped by the NICU to see Hailey. She didn't have too many wires. Just an IV and a nasal cannula for oxygen. Needless to say I was a bit emotional at this point since it all was too familiar.
They got me pumping right away and the lactation specialist was pleasantly surprised at my output. We were hoping to get some good sleep that night. Unfortunately we were right by the nurses station and man were they noisy!
To be continued...
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Night before the C-Section
Here's the bump, the night before the C-section! Hailey will be here tomorrow. We are excited and I am a little nervous. We have to get to the hospital at 9am for the procedure at 11.
Thought this would be humorous. This was me the night before Kaitlyn was born. Now I see why the doctor keeps saying Hailey is big...
Monday, September 24, 2012
The Last Weekend as a Family of 3
My C-section is scheduled for this Friday, so this was our last weekend as a family of 3. I can't believe Hailey is almost here!
On Friday we ate dinner on the patio at Aldaco's. As soon as we got there, Kaitlyn ran to play with the (older) kids. It was cute watching her run with the boys playing football, but it made us a little uneasy. The area isn't completely enclosed so we had to worry about her going towards the parking lot or down the hill/cliff. Not to mention worrying about one of the boys running her over.
It wasn't hard to imagine us there again soon with sweet baby Hailey by our side.
On Friday we ate dinner on the patio at Aldaco's. As soon as we got there, Kaitlyn ran to play with the (older) kids. It was cute watching her run with the boys playing football, but it made us a little uneasy. The area isn't completely enclosed so we had to worry about her going towards the parking lot or down the hill/cliff. Not to mention worrying about one of the boys running her over.
It wasn't hard to imagine us there again soon with sweet baby Hailey by our side.
Saturday, September 15, 2012
37 weeks
Baby Hailey is still camping out, all cozy in momma's tummy. I've definitely reached the uncomfortable stage. My hands are falling asleep all day long. This morning the pain was almost unbearable. My hand burned and the pain was shooting up my arm to my elbow and shoulder.
Tuesday is my last scheduled visit and is considered my pre-op appointment. The c-section is scheduled for September 28!
I'm ready but nervous. I hope Kaitlyn doesn't get too jealous. We will definitely be sure to continue to shower her with love and attention.
2 weeks to go!
Tuesday is my last scheduled visit and is considered my pre-op appointment. The c-section is scheduled for September 28!
I'm ready but nervous. I hope Kaitlyn doesn't get too jealous. We will definitely be sure to continue to shower her with love and attention.
2 weeks to go!
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