March 13, 2011 - 9 Days Old

I haven't been able to post for the past few days because I have been out of town. On Friday before I left, I stopped by the hospital with Skylar. We went to Amaraa's room and she was so happy to see Sky. It had been more than a week since she saw him last and she missed him a lot. I left Skylar with Amaraa and went up to the NICU to visit Aiden. He was doing really well. They had decreased his oxygen to 2 liters and he was improving a lot. The respiratory specialist showed me his lung x-rays from that morning and his lungs had really cleared up since the last time I saw them.

I went back down to Amaraa's room and she told me that Dr. Anderson had been in early that morning and told her that she was doing really well. He said she should be able to go home pretty soon. She was really happy about that. After living at the hospital for the last eight weeks, she is ready to go home. She is getting up and moving a lot more and is able to make it back and forth to the bathroom on her own. After spending a few minutes with Amaraa, Skylar and I headed out of town.

On Saturday, Amaraa called me from the NICU and told me that she was there with Aiden. When babies are born premature or with low birthweight, doctors encourage moms and dads to hold the baby skin-to-skin. This close contact not only helps parents bond with their babies and vice versa, but it also stimulates the mother's body to produce the exact type of milk the baby needs. Any germs on the baby's skin are transferred to the mom's body, which produces antibodies for those germs and then transfers the antibodies back to the baby through the breastmilk.

Sky and I came back into town last night and stopped at the hospital on the way through. Amaraa had felt so good earlier in the day that she had told her nurse that she didn't want any pain medication. That decision caught up with her at about 8:00 PM. She started having some pretty severe pain again and called her nurse to get some meds. Unfortunately, it took some time for her medicine to kick in, so she suffered for a while. She was tired, so we left her alone so she could get some rest.

This morning, Amaraa called and said that Dr. Anderson had been in to talk to her. He said that if everything goes well today, they will probably be able to send her home tomorrow. I took a shower and headed to the hospital. While I was showering, Skylar threw up. "Great," I thought. I told him to take it easy today, hoped that it was just a fluke, and headed for the hospital. When I walked into Amaraa's hospital room, Amaraa was on the phone with her mom who was telling her that Sky had just thrown up again. Just to give some perspective, Sky has had two colds within the past week and a half. Now this just as Amaraa is getting ready to come home. If Amaraa or I get sick, we can't visit the baby, so that's about the worst thing that can happen right now.

Amaraa had waited for me so we could visit Aiden together, so as soon as she got off the phone, I loaded her in the wheelchair and we went to the NICU. Amaraa moved into a recliner Aiden's nurse had brought in for her and held Aiden skin-to-skin again. He had been fussing a little bit when we first got there, but as soon as he felt that closeness with his mommy, he calmed right down. Amaraa held him like that for about a half hour. 

After our time with Aiden, we went back to Amaraa's room. The ICU doctor came in and told Amaraa that her latest blood tests showed that her blood was a little bit thicker than they had wanted it to be. He decided to increase her coumadin and give her another blood test tomorrow to make sure they get it where it needs to be. If it's too thick, she will be at risk of blood clots, so they don't want to send her home until they get the coumadin dosage right. The good news is that he signed a discharge order for her for tomorrow, so unless the blood test comes back bad, we're a go for launch. Amaraa's mom called her and said that Skylar had thrown up again. I decided I had better go home and take care of Sky.

By the time I got home, Skylar was feeling much better. I gave him some Sprite and saltine crackers and he was good to go. I showed Skylar, Jasmine, and Amaraa's mom all of the pictures of Aiden I had taken today. I hung out with the kids for a while and then put them to bed. They can't wait until tomorrow. Hopefully they'll get their mom back again.