Alex's NICU Journey

So, as I said in the last blog, Alex was born 11 weeks early, on April 21, 2007, weighing only 2 pounds 2 ounces. Babies this small of course cannot go straight home. In fact, they took him straight from my stomach, into a part of the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit)where they checked his breathing and all of his levels and put him onto a bunch of machines that would basically keep him alive for the next few weeks or months. The first oxygen machine they tried Alex on was the ventilator to see how well he did. He did really well and didn't need quite that much help so they put him on what they call CPAP. CPAP stands for Continuous Positive Airway Pressure. A lot of adults use a CPAP machine for sleep apnea. Alex had what is called Apnea of prematurity, which is why this machine worked well for him. He would forget to breathe and in that case, we could turn up the machine so that it gave him more air. The way that the CPAP mask is made for infants is that there is a fat tube that goes across his face and up each side of his face. They attach the tubing to a little hat so that it can't move around much when the baby moves. The first time I saw Alex he was wearing the CPAP, and he had a feeding tube in his nose. He was so tiny at the time. When I saw him I was sad because he was so helpless. He also had wires coming from his chest and stomach. These wires were to watch Alex's heart rate and breathing stats.

When he was about 10 days old, I was told that Alex had a PDA (Patent Ductus Arteriosis, basically a small hole between his heart and the arteries going from his heart to his lungs). Because of this, the blood that carries the oxygen to the lungs was not able to get through. First the Dr's tried giving him Ibuprofen which was supposed to help close up the hole. They did one round of the medicine and they said that it was working, so they did a second round. After that they thought that the hole had closed almost all the way but the next day they told me that it had opened back up on its own and they needed to do surgery. My baby boy was still so tiny and helpless and they wanted to do a heart surgery on him! This was so scary. They closed the entire NICU to other parents, no one was allowed to visit. They took all the other babies that were in Alex's area out and moved them to other areas. They did the surgery on May 9th, 2007 and they did it right in his bed. The lid of his incubator went up and the walls came down so they were able to do the surgery there. The surgery only took about an hour but it seemed like forever.

The time after he had his surgery was even worse. Alex had more trouble breathing after the surgery than he had before, he was on more oxygen and on more meds, he looked like he was in so much pain. He was swollen all over, especially in his face, because his body was "retaining water." I stayed at the hospital that night until 4 am. Kristy had texted me around 1 asking how things were going and I told her that I was still there and that I was worried so she came to the hospital to be with me and Alex. Around 4 we decided Alex was doing a little bit better and the nurses kept telling me that I needed to go home and get some rest so we both left. Within a few days, Alex was doing so much better. There were lots more ups and down while Alex was in the NICU but this had to be the scariest.

Alex had his very first bottle on May 25, 2007. It was so cute feeding such a little baby such a big bottle... and it was only a 2 ounce bottle! LOL. The first few times were really hard but after a few days Alex got really good at sucking on the bottle and he was able to get rid of the feeding tube after not too long.


Alex moved into his "Big Boy Bed" on May 29, 2007. He had been in an incubator until this day. He got to be in a regular bed where I could come in and hold him whenever I wanted and love on him as much as I wanted. I was so excited when I walked into the NICU and saw him in a regular bed! This is a really big step because it means that the baby is learning how to regulate their own body temperature. Babies in the NICU can't go home until they are able to do that.

Another thing Alex had to do before he could come home from the hospital was he had to pass a "Car Seat Test." Basically, because Alex had the Apnea of Prematurity problem, they had to make sure that being strapped into a car seat wouldn't freak him out and make him have another one of his apnea spells. They put him in the car seat the day before he came home and they left him there for an hour, while they watched his monitors. He did very well! This meant that he was able to come home!!! After 69 long stressful scary days in the NICU, my baby boy came home. On June 28, he was out of the hospital and I brought him home.

Alex

Now it’s time for the story of Alex’s birth. This is a SUPER LONG one, sorry…

*****The picture to the right is when I was pregnant with Alex, about 5 weeks before he was born!*****

After I lost Jakob, I had a really hard time with everything. An old ex-boyfriend got back in touch with me and it seemed to me like he was making things easier. Of course, I was vulnerable at the time and fell back in love with him almost instantly. He made me laugh and smile at times when it was really hard to do so. Well, we dated for a while and ended up moving in together. Around the middle of November, 2006, I thought I was pregnant again. I had mentioned it to the guy that I was seeing at the time and he just brushed it off. I asked what we would do if I was pregnant and he never wanted to talk about it. Around Thanksgiving time, he was already pushing me further and further away. By the middle of December, I KNEW I was pregnant. I was getting the morning sickness and I hadn’t had my period. At this time, I found out that the “father” was seeing someone else and him and I ended our relationship. I was so scared… I didn’t want to go through losing another baby without the father being around. I was scared to lose the baby that I was carrying, I was scared that something bad would happen like it did with Jakob, I was scared that people would judge me because I was pregnant and the “father” was already seeing someone else. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t tell anyone I was pregnant. Finally in the middle of January, when I was already 11 weeks pregnant, I went to see a High Risk OB-GYN. Of course, they told me I should have come in sooner and all, but they understood my fears as well. The Dr put me on Blood Pressure medication and told me to watch my blood pressure very closely. He told me that he thought we’d be able to catch any problems a lot sooner than with Jakob because he was going to have me come in every other week for check ups and have an ultra sound once a month. After this first appointment, I told the “father” what the Dr said and he told me to keep him posted and that he wanted to be there for the next appointment, but he never talked to me again after he said that. Anyway, off the subject of Alex’s “father”, about a week after that appointment, towards the end of January, I decided I could finally tell my friends and family. I let everyone know by showing them the ultra sound pictures and telling them to look at the date. For the most part, everyone was excited. In March, I went and told Alex’s other grandparents. They told me that when I had called and told them that I wanted to see them, they had a feeling I was pregnant. They seemed happy and mad at the same time. I was already almost 6 months pregnant and I was just telling them, so I could understand their feelings.

On April 15th, my OB-GYN went out of the country for vacation. That same day, I was going to a friends house for a birthday party and after being there for about 5 minutes I walked to my car so I could go to the gas station and get a drink. As soon as I got to my car I was sick to my stomach. It came out of nowhere. That was when I had a feeling something was wrong. That night I didn’t feel quite as sick, I had started to feel better. The next day I was supposed to go to dinner after work with my friend. When I got home though, I felt light headed and checked my blood pressure. It was pretty high. At this point I was 28 weeks pregnant. I knew that I had gotten further than I did with Jakob, but everyone always says that it’s best to go past about 36 weeks. I did not want to lose another baby and I was scared out of my mind. My friend and I ended up sitting at my house instead of going out. I thought that when I went to bed, my blood pressure would go down. I woke up the next morning and took my blood pressure before even getting out of bed and it was still high. I went to work and from work I called the Dr and his nurse told me to come in as soon as possible. I left work and told my boss I’d be back shortly….

That was April 17, 2007. I went in and they watched my blood pressure for about half an hour and told me that they were admitting me because I had the beginning stages of Pre-eclampsia/Toxemia again. I started crying right away. I was so scared and didn’t want to go through this again. All that day they gave me magnesium sulfate to lower my blood pressure and they started watching my urine output and everything. The next day they got all my levels stable and sent me to another room. They told me that they were thinking of putting me on bed rest, IN THE HOSPITAL, for the next 11 weeks, or until the baby came. I don’t think Alex liked that idea any more than I did because all of me levels were back up way more than before the next day and my Pre-eclampsia had advanced to HELLP Syndrome. They decided on the 19th that they had to induce me and get Alex out. All night on the 19th and all day the 20th, I didn’t have a single contraction. On Saturday, April 21st at about 7:30 am the Dr’s decided they had to do a C-section because nothing was happening and my body was getting worse. My mom couldn’t come in to the birthing room because she was really sick at the time and didn’t want to get Alex sick. My dad was also sick. I could have called so many friends, but I wanted to give Alex’s other grandmother a chance to be there. I called her and she was there as soon as she could be. Now, let me just tell you how awkward it is to be laying down on a surgery table with your arms strapped down and have them take all your clothes off in front of your ex’s mom! LOL Anyway, I could feel them moving around inside my stomach and it was a really weird feeling and it started to make me nauseous so they gave me some more medicine… which knocked me out completely! I still wish that they hadn’t done that because I definitely wasn’t the first one to see my baby. He was born at 10:21 am on April 21, 2008. He was born exactly 11 weeks before his due date.



I woke up only to see pictures of my baby boy laying on the bed next to me. I didn’t know what was going on because I was in panic mode and pretty much everything they had told me about the Neonatal ICU the day before, had disappeared from my mind. I was wondering where my baby was and when I could see him and if he was ok! Later that night, around 9 pm, they wheeled my bed to another room again and as they did that, they pushed me through the NICU and they stopped at my baby’s incubator. He was so tiny and he looked so helpless! The nurse was very nice, she went over a lot of information with me. But she could tell that I was still pretty out of it so I think she tried to keep it short. She did tell me, he was 2 pounds 2 ounces when he was born. He was 15 inches long, and he didn’t even need to be on a ventilator because he was breathing well enough that he could be on the next machine above that which is called a C-PAP machine. It was still helping him breathe but not quite as much.


This is where our Journey began……

More to come!

Jakob

Jakob was my first baby so I wanted to share his story...

I got pregnant on October 15th, 2005. I was so excited. I would have been a single mom because the dad wanted nothing to do with the baby but I had a feeling I could do it on my own and I knew that my baby would make me extremely happy. I was sick through most of my pregnancy. Everyone kept telling me "Don't worry, the morning sickness will go away when you're about 3-4 months along" but it never seemed to go away. I lost a total of 20 lbs in the first 4 and a half months of my pregnancy and then the last month before I lost Jakob I suddenly gained about 30 lbs. It was really strange to me. One day when I left work I had this really strange pain in my lower chest/upper abdomen area and it was just getting worse and worse. I checked my blood pressure at a grocery store because the Dr's had told me to keep an eye on it since it had been a little elevated since I got pregnant. Well when I checked it at the store, it was 170 over 105. I didn't know how bad that was but my mom also said that blood pressure goes up when you're in pain anyway so I went home and tried to relax. Every way I sat or laid down I was just in horrible pain. I felt like I couldn't breathe. That night my sister sent me a message asking how I was doing and I told her I was in a lot of pain and I was really scared that something was wrong. Within minutes my mom called and asked what was wrong. She came to get me and took me to the ER. I was 19 weeks and 6 days at the time. I guess if you're less than 20 weeks then the ER takes you but anything more than 20 weeks they send you to labor and delivery. So they checked everything they could think of and decided it was just heartburn. They sent me home with some medicine and I felt ok the next day. But the day after that the pain came back just as bad. This was a Tuesday. I called my OB but she was out of the office that day so I called another Dr in the same clinic and went to see her. She said the same thing, heartburn. But the next morning my OB's Secretary left me a voice mail saying that I had to come in right away. I called her back and she asked if I was on my way, I told her no but I could come in. As soon as I got there the nurse was already waiting for me, didn't wait for me to check in or anything. She checked my blood pressure and had me pee in a cup and all and then the Dr came in. She saw me and my roommate laughing and she said "I need you to take this seriously. I need you (pointing at my roommate) to take her straight to the University Hospital and don't stop on the way. Go to Labor and delivery and Dr. Silver, a High Risk Dr is waiting for you. And I'm sorry but (and I saw her hold back tears) don't plan on coming home with a baby." I instantly started balling my eyes out. I had no idea what was going on or why I wouldn't be leaving with my baby. I was freaking out. I called my mom and told her what was going on and she said she'd meet me at the hospital. When we got there I had about 8 nurses all start asking me questions and poking me with needles and hooking me up to machines. Finally one of them told me that the Dr thought I had preeclampsia. My blood pressure was 190/120 and my liver enzymes were low (I honestly can't remember if they were low or high, I got so confused) and my blood plateletts were low. They took blood every two hours. A couple hours later the Dr came in and told me that I definitely had Pre-eclampsia and that I had 24 hours to decide whether I wanted to try to carry the baby longer to let him live or if I wanted to just induce labor and lose the risk of both of us dying. I had no idea what to say. But 2 hours later another set of Dr's came in and said that my plateletts had dropped so much that I had HELLP syndrome which is the worst form of Preeclampsia and I was almost to where I would need a blood transfusion so they had to induce immediately and I basically didn't have a choice. That was all Wednesday.

Friday morning, March 3rd, 2006, I delivered a beautiful baby boy who was only 215 grams (they thought I had the preeclampsia long enough that he was underdeveloped) and he was 9 inches long. I named him Jakob Donald (Donald after my dad). He was so tiny and so helpless. His nose and mouth were perfectly shaped and his fingers and toes were perfect. I cried all that night and the next day and I still cry a lot from losing him. The hospital kept him until I went home a week later so I could see him whenever I wanted. They also made little hand and foot molds for me to take hom and they took pictures of him for me. I got my baby cremated and I keep some of his ashes in a locket around my neck so he's always with me.