Our hospital stay

We got in Friday night, really, late. I don't think they did another heel prick but they hooked him up to a monitor and he had to have sensors placed on him and the bili light underneath him. With all those wires it was a mess trying to get him out to feed and change him. The monitor would go off every minute all night long. The next day another heel prick and an IV was put in. It takes a really special person to put an IV needle in a newborn. They use the tiniest needles looking for the tiniest of veins. Thank God she got it in quick, but it was awful to see him on it since they had to bandage up his hand really good.

His bili number came back at only 19.3 (it was 19.5 when we were admitted I just thought it was 18) so it was terrible that it didn't much at all. The plan then was to do another heel prick that evening, that maybe with the formula, breast milk, and IV that the number would drop. That evening 19.0. Not enough but at least they took the IV out and the took the sensors off. I felt so much better about that at least. Sunday morning, another heel prick. The number 18.3! The doctor would like to see a 15 but if it continues to drop that evening we can go home and we could probably just take home the bili light to use a little longer. Later that evening the number spiked to 18.8. I was a hot mess just bawling thinking the worst. The doctor recommended a million tests and an incubator. So they had to draw like 2 tubes of blood. My poor baby was being pricked everyday of his first few days in the world. His feet had several red dots on them. Once in the incubator I felt a little more at peace because this was going to kill the jaundice and we would go home. Plus he looked so cute with his shades and his arms raised over his head. He was nice and warm.

I think back sometimes and wonder how we made it through that week. When we were at the hospital we were awake maybe every 2-3 hours to feed him. Justin kept a log of every oz of breast milk and formula he took at what time and whether he pooped or peed. He was so diligent and perfect at that that the nurses were impressed and wanted a copy of his log, lol. He was pretty scared during this time too. If someone would have told us that jaundice is so common and the numbers can drop and spike or that jaundice can last longer than his did then I probably wouldn't have been so scared. Finally Monday morning came and another heel prick followed by the best news ever! his number was 15.8! We got to go home that day but had to follow up with our pediatrician the next day for another heel prick.

Yay, I'm going home!

The crazy thing is that the next day his bili number was up again at 17. Yeah, it was a roller coaster of emotions. I barely had time to get over my birth experience. I told Justin that if jaundice wouldn't have happened then I could've easily processed and taken in the birth as not too bad but all of this made for a week of hell. Ok so again we went on Wednesday for the last heel prick and it was down to 14. On his one week birthday nonetheless :) Stay tuned to hear the joys of breastfeeding (insert sarcasm here)!