A Beagle and A Baby

10 weeks and Liver Update

2012-02-24T20:40:00.004-07:00

Elliott is 10 weeks old today. That's 2 weeks from 3 months! 3 months is 1 month from 4 months, which is 2 months from 6 months. Not like I'm counting or anything. I don't want to wish away the days of him being tiny, but.......oh who am I kidding. I really dislike (hate) the newborn phase. I am much better with older babies and much, much better with toddler and up. Give me a 3 year old any day of the week.

So, I wanted to talk about on the appointment with Dr. Miloh that we had on Wednesday. Elliott's bilirubin three weeks ago was 3.6. It is now at 3.0. That is good. It is going down. Dr. Miloh did say, though, that it is not going down as much or as fast as he expected or would like (normal, by the way, is .4) The big shock was Elliott's GGT level. GGT is short for gamma-glutamyl transferase. GGT levels may be used to determine the cause of an elevated alkaline phosphatase (ALP). Both ALP and GGT are elevated in disease of the bile ducts and in some liver diseases, but only ALP will be elevated in bone disease. Increased levels of GGT levels may indicate in general that the liver is being damaged but does not specifically point to a condition that may be causing the injury. Elliott's GGT level has been trending down since we first started testing it. Normal for a baby his age is in the 100's. A month ago his was 330. Then it was 296. At our last appointment it was 255. This week it was 1,300.

We were floored. Speechless. I kind of had to brace myself on the desk when Dr. Miloh gave us that number. He told us that we shouldn't get worked up over one number on one test on one day, but really, 1,300? He also requested that we track down the chest x-ray that Elliott had during his sepsis hospitalization, because sometimes an elevated GGT level can indicate congestive heart failure.

Based on the new lab numbers, the previous ultrasounds that we had, how long we've been dealing with this, and the news that the seizures were continuing, Dr. Miloh is now exploring the possibility of a rare metabolic disease. Elliott passed his newborn screener that looks at the 28 most common metabolic infant diseases, but there are thousands of others that are not screened. Elliott had more blood taken at the lab at Phoenix Children's Hospital and also a urine sample so they can start testing. Some of these tests take weeks to conduct and have to be sent to labs outside of the state. It will be a while before we have the results of everything. One thing that we do know for sure is that Elliott does not have alpha 1- antitrypsin. Those results were finally back. I won't even explain what that is, because we know for sure he doesn't have it.

Dr. Miloh was very interested to hear that the latest EEG was positive for continued seizure activity. We told him that we made an appointment to see an epileptologist at Phoenix Children's Barrow's institute but can't get in until April. He said that he would try to "pull some strings" to get us in earlier. He has a hunch that the seizures are part of the big picture and we need the epileptologist on the team to help figure it out. We're grateful that he's going to use his position for an extra push, but also terrified that he thinks it is so important. I'd rather be told that it's not a big deal.

We also talked a lot about Elliott's growth. Dr. Miloh wants us to start working with the nutritionists in his office. I checked out a book called Diseases of the Liver and Biliary System in Children from the U of A Health Sciences Library. This information was taken directly from this book. It really explains what we are up against:

There are many causes of cholestatic liver disease, which can be divided into two groups: those presenting in infancy and those presenting in the older child. Babies with cholestatic liver disease usually have increased energy and nutrient requirements, up to twice the estimated average requirement, as a result of malabsorption, higher energy expenditure and infection.

Most infants with cholestatic liver disease will require feed modification. If bile flow is limited from the liver into the gut, fat emulsification and digestion are reduced. This causes malabsorption of fat, fat-soluble vitamins, essential fatty acids and some minerals, leading to steatorrhoea, growth failure and rickets.

Cholestatic babies often consume huge volumes of standard infant formuls or breast milk, because of malabsorption of Long-Chain Triglycerides (LCT) in dietary fat, which require bile for digestion and absorption. As fat is the major energy source at this age, the infants are not satisfied by their milk and consume large volumes to compensate. To promote growth it is essential to improve absorption by manipulating dietary fat and substituting LCT with Medium Chain Triglycerides (MCT). MCT does not require emulsification with bile and is absorbed directly into the portal vein.

Cholestatic breast-fed babies will demand frequent feeds, which is exhausting for the mother. Mothers are encouraged to continue breast feeding when possible, but the introduction of an MCT-containing formula, as a top up or supplementary feed, will reduce demand on the mother.

MCT containing formula should continue until the infant’s bilirubin level is within normal range or the child has had a liver transplant. If growth is still failing, despite resolution of cholestasis, the introduction of a high enery infant formula can be successful in maintaining growth.

Dr. Miloh did point out at the appointment this week that there is absolutely no reason for me to stop nursing. He even said that Elliott must be getting a great deal of milk from me because he is actually gaining weight, just not as much as we would like or as much as he would without the cholestasis. Some babies with cholestasis gain nothing at all, even on a diet of pure formula and even when solids are added. That made me feel better. He said there is no reason I need to change anything until we meet with the nutritionist in 2 weeks because we are not at a "critical" point yet. When we do meet with her we are going to talk about food supplementation, as well as vitamin supplementation, which we have already started. His vitamin drops contain between 200-1000% of his daily needs (depending on the vitamin).

Dr. Miloh did give us a free sample of the type of formula that we will need to start supplementing with if it comes to that. It is called Pregestimil, for babies with fat malabsorbtion problems. He gave us the sample because #1) This formula is not available off the shelf. It must be prescribed by a doctor and you buy it from a pharmacy, and #2) One small can of it usually costs around $30.

If Elliott continues to have cholestasis and growth problems as he gets older the book gives suggestions for getting extra calories into toddlers and kids. They include adding butter, cheese and heavy cream to everything you can, frying all meats in oil and butter, adding sugar to everything you can and encouraging the consumption of fatty, sugary snacks.

How do you think it's going to go over with Spencer when he is eating his healthy, well rounded dinner and Elliott is eating fried chicken, cheese and cookies?

Well, that is it for the depressing update. Spencer and Michael are going to Transportation Day tomorrow. Elliott and I are staying home to nurse about 80 times and hopefully nap. The next post will have some great pictures of Spencer with trucks and cars and buses. I'm crossing my fingers for it because, if you'll remember, Michael took zero pictures at Disneyland when I was in the hospital.

P.S. On a very positive note, Elliott is lifting his eyebrows (like a curious look) when he makes eye contact and he was genuinely smiling at me today. It lasted about 5 minutes and then he started fussing again.

Avoidance

2012-02-23T20:37:00.000-07:00

We had an appointment with Dr. Miloh (the liver doctor) yesterday. We were there for almost 4 hours. We got some not so great news. I'm going to write a whole post about it but I do not have the time or the energy right now. It took 10 weeks but I am officially exhausted. I'm falling asleep at random times during the day (for like 30 seconds at a time. It's more like narcolepsy, not a decent nap), my leg is twitching and I'm having word finding difficulty. So, right now I'm avoiding the subject entirely and talking about some of the other stuff that happened this week.

Do you remember me talking, last fall, about running into a "stalker" at the outdoor mall in Tucson? Well Jeannette is officially a friend now. We even talked on the phone. She was so kind and lent us this Fisher Price Rocker after seeing it on my Elliott Pinterest board. He doesn't love it, but we're working on getting him in here for naps. Even like 30 minutes twice a week would be good. I seriously don't mind holding him, but I do have another kid to take care of and Elliott doesn't always sleep in the moby wrap or belle carrier.

Last night we let Spencer take a bath in the dark with glo-sticks. Occupied him for a good hour.

It was 80 degrees today. We went for a walk in the afternoon and were so warm after we got back that I let Elliott wear a short sleeve onesie and nothing else.

It was warm enough for Spencer to play outside in the water. I let him turn on the hose and do whatever he wanted with it. He had the time of his life.

Do you know who this is? It's actually Spencer at almost the exact same age Elliott is right now. They might be a couple of days different. Totally coincidentally I pulled this same onesie out of the drawer for him to wear tonight. Spencer was 5 pounds 15 ounces when he was born, went down to 5 pound 10 ounces and then was 7 pounds 13 ounces at 2 months. Elliott was 6 pounds 13 ounces at birth, went down to 6 pounds 2 ounces and, with his liver issues, was also 7 pounds 13 ounces at 2 months. I find it very interesting that they were both preemies and the exact same size at 2 months.

Anyway, I tried to take a comparison photo, but Elliott would have none of it. I also find it interesting that in these photos colicky Spencer is not crying and not colicky Elliott is. In his defense, he's just as tired as I am right now. And just so you know, we've decided that while Elliott is not colicky and doesn't cry as much he is just as high needs (not even counting his health issues) as Spencer was.

I have to make it through tomorrow and then Michael will be home for the weekend and I'll try to do the post about current health developments.

Tid Bits

2012-02-19T19:15:00.001-07:00

The granola bars we made are delicious. We found milk and white chocolate striped chocolate chips in the bulk bins at Sprouts. I think the stripyness of the chips enhances the deliciousness of the entire bar. The recipe for these came from the blog of a woman who has 7 sons, homeschools all of them and is pregnant with her 8th baby. Reading about her makes me want to cry and then slap someone. I told Michael this week that I felt like I was ruining all of our lives. I only have 2 sons and I'm barely managing to keep us afloat.

Spencer has started lying and being openly defiant. He's not a very good liar at all. Example- he was rubbing Elliott's face with a plastic hanger. I told him to stop it. He told me he wasn't doing it. Riiiiiiiight. He is very good at being defiant. We had a 20 minute argument about him wiping up some milk he spilled. He gave me 57 excuses why it was not his fault and he shouldn't have to do it. I know that this is all stemming from 1) having a new baby in the house and 2) having very stressed out parents of the baby (because he's a baby and because he's had so many medical issues) All of this has led to some rough days and quite a few meltdowns. As a way to try to deal with the meltdown part we made a calm down jar. You shake it and calm down while you watch the glitter fall to the bottom.

Wouldn't you know it......there have been no meltdowns this week. Lying and defiance, yes, but melting down, no.

I may not be the birthing 8 kids and then homeschooling the bunch of them type, but I did help Spencer to make homemade Valentines for his class.

I think they were pretty cute. I like that he didn't give candy too.

Spencer put these on the other day, proclaimed "I'm a real cowboy now" and ran around the kitchen yelling "giddyup little horsie" over and over.

I love these kids.

Spencer had his class picture taken last week. This was his practice pose in his picture outfit.

When he got home from school after class pictures he put on his pajamas because he wanted to be comfy (he gets that from me), then added his halloween costume and a dolphin nose.

Then he ran around in circles for about 30 minutes.

We made slime using water, glue, food coloring and borax today.

Spencer got himself a little blue food coloring Hitler mustache.

Now we have a bowl full of blue slime and we're not sure what to do with it.

My parents spent the night on Saturday night.

They brought Spencer some Mardi Gras stuff. He's all ready for Fat Tuesday. You'll have to ask him why he insists on adding the pig hat.

And finally,

#10

The look on Spencer's face when he came to the dinner table and saw this was PRICELESS. Too bad I didn't think to have the camera ready.

He ate it leg by leg. It was awesome.

That's all. Random tid bit post is done.

2 Months

2012-02-17T22:57:00.009-07:00

The Official 2 Month Picture

Date

February 16, 2012

Weight

He was 7 pounds 13 ounces at his 2 month appointment today. Elliott is gaining weight, he is just gaining slowly. He was officially diagnosed with newborn cholestasis by his liver doctor. One of the problems that babies with cholestasis have is slow weight gain because the liver has a hard time absorbing nutrients and fat.

Less official pictures

Sleep

Elliott generally goes to bed between 9 and 10. He wakes up 2-3 times during the night to nurse, falls right back to sleep after and then wakes up in the morning between 8 and 9. A couple of times this month he woke up between 5 and 7 and never fell back asleep. It was tragic for me. He is generally taking a short nap around 11 am and a longer nap in the afternoon. He's exclusively sleeping with/on me at night and on me or in the moby wrap or belle carrier for naps. I kind of have permission from his doctors to do this though, because his neurologist wants us watching for seizures and his liver doctor wants his cotisol levels down and maternal contact/not being stressed by being forced to sleep alone helps with that. Elliott falls alseep easily at night and after each time he nurses at night. He is not so easy during the day. There have been a few times where I've had a hell of a time getting him to sleep.

Movement

Elliott rolled over from his stomach to his back at the neurologists office on Monday the 13th. He has done it a dozen more times at home since then. His adjusted age the first time he did it was 3 weeks. Pretty impressive. He can roll from his back to his side, but can't quite get himself over to his stomach. That is developmentally appropriate at 6 months, though, so it's OK that he can't.

Communication

Elliott is no longer grunting as much. He grunts a little when he is trying to wake himself up. Elliott is making great eye contact with us.

Sweet Remembrances:

1) Elliott's first trip to Tucson to meet his great grandmother.

2) Taking Elliott on an ill advised outing to his first wedding.

3) Elliott's first Valentine's Day.

4) Giving what looked like purposeful smiles a couple of times to me and Michael.

Not So Sweet Rememberances

1) Being told that Elliott might have a terrible liver disease.

2) Going to the lab over and over and over for blood draws.

3) Multiple trips to the liver doctor (even though we really like Dr. Miloh).

4) Being told by the neurologist that Elliott is still having seizures.

Food

Exclusively breastfeeding- between 9 and 11 times a day.

(This was taken on the 15th)

Mood

Elliott is fussy in the evenings. Right when we're trying to eat dinner is his hardest time of day. Great. He has also proven to not be the "fall asleep in the carseat" baby we had hoped for and that our friends claim exist (in some mythical land called, Notourchildren). His cries (screams, actually) about 50% of the time in the car. When he's not screaming he is calm, but wide awake.

(this was taken on the 17th)

Medicine
How crappy is it that a 2 month old update includes medicine? Elliott has been on 1.875 mL (twice a day) of phenobarbital since he was in the hospital. In the last month he also started taking ursodiol (1 mL twice a day) to try to clear bile and conjugated bilirubin out of his system and fat soluble vitamin drops (1 mL once a day) because babies with liver disease have a hard time absorbing vitamins. He was just started on a new seizure medication called keppra (.4 mL twice a day). We just started weaning him off the phenobarbital. His medications are flavored with cherry (phenobarbital and keppra), vanilla (ursodiol) and citrus (vitamin drops). He loves them. It's going to be horrible trying to get him to eat a vegetable after this early exposure to sweets. His vitamin drops are the color and consistency of red, sticky paint. It is a nightmare giving them to him and requires both parents and even then we make a huge mess of it. They also make his poop bright orange with a large spot of red in the middle. TOO MUCH INFORMATION. The neurologist told us that sometimes keppra can cause mood changes. In a baby this would show up as unstoppable screaming and crying. Good God I hope not.

(can you see what the patch says? Brothers Rule)

Likes/Dislikes

Elliott still likes being held by mommy and daddy. He likes his medicine. He likes being in the belle carrier and the moby wrap, but only if he can look out. He doesn't want anything obstructing his view. He SCREAMS every morning when I put him in the infant seat while I take a shower. Only once (on Wednesday, actually) has he not cried to whole time I'm in the shower (which, by the way, my showers are averaging 3 minutes with an additional 1.5 minutes to dry off and get dressed. I look like a train wreck every day). He likes going for walks, but only when he can look around. I had to take the newborn neck support off the belle carrier otherwise he throws a huge fit because he can't see. It's OK, I just have to support his neck which leaves me not 2 hands free, but 1 hand free- enough to start laundry or empty the dishwasher.

Some Side Notes

I told our pediatrician that I was not happy with the neurologists advice to keep a close eye on Elliott's development and come back in 2 months. I told her I wanted to take him to an epileptologist at Barrow's Neurological Institute. Barrow's is one of the highest rated (ie the BEST) neurological hospitals in the entire damn world and it's practically in our backyard. We might as well take advantage of it. She agreed. We'll be calling on Monday to make an appointment.

Elliott was due to get 5 shots and the rota virus oral vaccination at his 2 month check-up today. Our pediatrician's office goes off of the CDC recommendations. We kept to the recommended vaccination schedule for Spencer and never missed any shots or deviated from the schedule. Well he did get his first MMR shot early because of a measles outbreak in Pima County (Tucson). Anyway, based on advice from our pediatrician we held off on the DTaP because it is contraindicated for children with undiagnosed neurological disorders. We also held off on the rota virus because it is a live vaccination and there is no research available on what its effect might be in a baby with liver disease. It makes me nervous that he is going without those for now, but I am so glad that we have such an awesome pediatrician that she would be so on top of things to give us those recommendations.

Valentine's Day 2012

2012-02-14T17:59:00.003-07:00

Are you blown away by my creative title? Imaginative, I know.

The day started out with several surprises. #1. Spencer had to pee at 5:10 am. He ended up in bed with me after. It has been months since he came in our bed that early. #2. Michael, literally on his way out the door, sees Spencer in bed with me, decides to not go to work and instead to come back to bed for a cuddle with us. Imagine my surprise when I woke up at 7:00 with Mr. Hungry Elliott.

It did make for a nice morning though.

We got to give Spencer his V-day presents together.

Then I got to take a shower without a screaming baby waiting for me. That's all the gift I need.

Then we did a photo shoot.

Elliott's First Valentine's Day!

I just love this one. Really. I think the fuss face is adorable.

Both the top and pants are 3 months. They are a bit big still.

The brothers

Michael left for work right after this and I had my first outing alone with both kids. We went to the apothecary shop for Elliott's liver medication. It took 20 minutes. Only 1 of them cried the whole time. I consider that successful.

We got some disappointing news yesterday. Elliott is still having seizures. The neurologist said he was stumped. Not what we wanted to hear. We were so surprised by the news that we didn't think of any questions until we got home. Now we have a million questions.

The neurologist did start Elliott on a new seizure medication- one that is processed by the kidneys, not the liver, since the liver doctor wants him off the phenobarbital in case it is messing with his liver function (since it is processed by the liver). It will take us a month to wean him off the phenobarbital (it is a barbituate and can not be stopped cold turkey or he will have symptoms of withdrawal) so for now he is on both. More frustration!

The only good thing was that he had gained a good amount of weight and grown another inch. His 2 month check-up is on Friday so I will report the official stats then.

Aloha Wedding

2012-02-12T18:10:00.001-07:00

I know I just barely got done telling you that Elliott was on lockdown and that we weren't going anywhere because of his house arrest. Well, we broke our own rules yesterday and went to a wedding. We know it was a big risk, but we took some precautions, we got through it and we are glad we went. We'll eat those words and slap ourselves if Elliott gets sick this week.

Kathy and Bobby got engaged right after Spencer was born. They talked about getting married right away and I was sick to my stomach thinking about how we were going to take Spencer to their wedding. He just cried all the time and was overwhelmed by noise and crowds. It would have been impossible. Well, one thing led to another and it took them 4 years to get married. We wish they had taken 3 so that we didn't have our newest newborn to take. Ha! But Elliott did 150% better than Spencer ever would have. We really, truly would not have been able to take Spencer at 8 weeks.

We tried to get a good picture of the boys before we left. Elliott is wearing a 3 month outfit. It's the other outfit I bought him the day we found out he was a boy. I'm amazed it fits him. I think it's on the smaller side of 3 months though.

We got there early and I nursed in the car before the wedding. We had a whole blanket cave/fort thing going, as much for protection from the sun as for privacy. It was 80 degrees yesterday.

I put Elliott in the moby wrap before we even walked in. He was facing me the whole time and once he fell asleep I covered his head. I stayed away from people and if anyone walked towards me I kind of aimed Elliott away from them. I came across as pretty rude, but I was trying to protect him.

The whole wedding was a Hawaiian/Aloha theme. It was held at a very unique Hawaiian reception place.

Both Bobby and Kathy have been married before and have children from those marriages, so all of their kids were in the wedding.

My friend Brendan is Kathy's brother (did puzzle pieces just click in your brain?). He gave her away.

The happy couple.

Spencer and Monica, Kathy's daughter.

Kathy's son got them a double bike.

After our luau dinner there was an entire Hawaiian show, including flame dancing.

The wedding party got their chance to dance too!

Again, we tried to get a good picture before we left. Elliott was done by the end of the night, though. He did so good the whole time, right up until we left. Our fault for waiting until the end of the night for the photo op.

He screamed the whole way home and was in no mood for pictures once we got home.

He is pretty darling though. I neglected to take a picture of him on Friday when he was 8 weeks (2nd child syndrome again) so this is 8 weeks 1 day. He'll be 2 months this week. I can't believe it.

I know it was risky taking him to the wedding, but we really did not want to miss it and it is the only event this spring that we'll take him to. There were only a couple of kids (2 others besides Spencer) and I kept a 50 foot radius from them at all times. Transportation Day is in 2 weeks and I'm sad that Elliott and I will miss it but that place will be a hot bed of kids and germs. Michael and Spencer are going though. It'll just be that much more fun when we go next year when Elliott is 14 months (!).

Pinterest Projects

2012-02-10T21:18:00.000-07:00

I mentioned before that I joined Pinterest a while ago. I don't remember exactly when I joined, but the first board I ever created was "ideas for the baby". That means I created it before we knew Elliott was a boy. That happened in August. The board has since been renamed "Elliott".

I really started using Pinterest a lot when Elliott came home from the hospital (the sepsis time, not the birth time. I hate that I have to specify). I needed something to do and look at while nursing. I don't want to just pin stuff though. I really want to do/make the things I pin.

Here are some of the things we have done so far:

Blowing up Ivory soap in the microwave.

Very fun.

World's best chocolate chip cookies.

Spencer and I have made these twice. They really are delicious. The secret seems to be adding cornstarch. Makes them have a very nice texture.

Using a big clip to keep your cell phone charger from falling

Terrible picture......simple idea that works very well.

Cinnamon Apple Chips

Tasty and they made the house smell amazing.

Marble painting

Not so successful. Our paint was too thick and the marbles got stuck. Spencer finished it with a paintbrush. We're going to try again with thinner paint.

Cheesy cauliflower "pancakes"

They were delicious.

Oreo cookies and cream bars

Great flavor but way, way, way too chewy.

Cream Cheese Banana Bread

We did muffins instead of loaves. Delicious! A real keeper.

We used leftover muffin liners from Elliott's baby shower.

Shower Head Cleaner

Didn't work for us.

These are the projects we have planned for this weekend:

1) Valentines for Spencer's classmates.

We bought the bugs, we just need to get some brown paper.

2) Some kitchen art.

I printed these,

and I'm combining it with this idea. Instead of modge podging pictures on painted wood, I'm modge podging the printables.

3) Making chocolate chip granola bars

Want to see/follow the links for all these cool things? I was fancy and added a "follow me on pinterest" button up there on the right under my "About Me" section.

Less of a bummer

2012-02-08T23:00:00.000-07:00

My last post was pretty depressing. I'm going to try to lighten the mood a bit with a random hodge podge of topics.

When I was pregnant with Elliott (which seems like it was about a year ago, not just 2 months ago) I had the greatest intentions on really keeping up with the blog. I wasn't going to be one of these people that falls off the face of the blogging earth for months at a time. Then reality, and sleeplessness, hit. And I find myself not having enough time to eat during the day, let alone blog.

I'm also finding it hard to come up with topics to blog about. Based on recommendations from our pediatrician, Elliott is banned from going anywhere because 1) he is a preemie to begin with so he is more susceptible to getting sick and 2) his body took a real hit with the sepsis and we can't risk him getting sick again. We have to be particularly careful to keep him away from other children. They are the real sickness spreaders. So until the end of April (the end of cold/flu/RSV season) he is on house arrest. That means I am mostly on house arrest. I've been trying to get out 2-3 times a week with just Spencer, but I get about 1-2 hours and then have to be back to nurse. Staying home all the time = no fun stories.

I'll try to do my best with some fun snippets.

I was up with Elliott around 5 am last week. Ginger wasn't in our room. Guess where I found her? On Spencer's bed. Spencer used to always sleep with his door closed. When my mom was his primary care giver she started leaving his door open and he insisted we do the same once we were back from the hospital. This gives Ginger access to him. I secretly love that she wants to sleep with her boy, but it's no bueno for his allergies. Do you see Spencer buried under his pillows? He refuses blankets but pillows seem to be OK. Crazy kid.

Michael leaves for work around 6:20 am. Elliott is usually up 2 or 3 times a night to eat. The nicest thing about him (compared to Spencer) is that he will nurse and fall back asleep easily during the night. Spencer used to take hours to get to sleep and sometimes he just never would sleep all night long. Anyway, Spencer usually comes in between 7:30 and 8:00 and we all sleep together until around 9:00. It is my favorite part of the day. Spencer and Ginger get into some funky positions.

Spencer and I went to a birthday party on Saturday. He had fun. I was anxious and panicky the whole time. I was really looking forward to feeling less anxiety with Elliott. No such luck. There is way more, and I was pretty darn anxious with Spencer given his 4 months of non-stop crying.

Elliott and Michael stayed home during the party and took a nap. Last week we were a little worried that Elliott was developing colic too. He was spending a lot more time crying. Then we realized that 1) he is just fussier in the evening. Normal fussy though. And 2) he is no longer just nodding off all day. Sometimes we have to really force him to sleep. Then his mood is improved.

My new goal is to actually eat breakfast at breakfast time. I'm so wrapped up in feeding Spencer, nursing Elliott and medicating both of them in the morning that I have been eating breakfast around 11:00. My other goals are to take more walks and drink more water. Baby steps. We'll work up to a real work-out later.

It was kind of chilly for our walk yesterday. I put Elliott in a hoodie.

He hated it.

Spencer turned 4 years 5 months on Monday

I was trying to take a cute picture of Elliott to put on facebook this morning. I like this one even though it's not very good.

He's a karate chopping ninja here.

I was trying to take this picture to tell people that we were headed back to the hospital for another EEG. We are hoping and praying that all the seizure activity is gone so we can stop the phenobarbital. Dr. Miloh wants him off that incase it is messing with his liver tests. We'll know the results on Monday.

We were very nervous about the EEG because the instructions said that Elliott had to be asleep for part of the test. During the day he is not the easiest to get to sleep. But as luck would have it he woke up freakishly early this morning (like 5:00) and never went back to sleep. By 11:00 he was pretty tired. He threw a huge fit when the tech started marking and scrubbing his scalp and after 5 minutes of heavy duty crying he passed out and slept through the whole thing. Huge sigh of relief.

Afterwards I nursed him in the car while Michael went to get us lunch in the cafeteria. Side note: the cafeteria at Banner Desert Hospital has the best onion rings I've ever had. Just a little tid bit we picked up from our 10 day stay.

And finally: the beagle from the title of the blog. She is very much enjoying the grass we planted for her.

Full Disclosure

2012-02-03T18:37:00.004-07:00

I have a confession to make. All has not been well around here. And it's not just typical newborn "our lives have changed" blues. We've been facing a lot of health issues crap. That's the only way I can think to put it. We didn't want to mention anything until we had some very important answers and now that we do we're going public.

Elliott was discharged from the hospital after having sepsis on Thursday, January 12th. On Monday, January 16th we had a follow up appointment with our pediatrician. Before we left she mentioned that she wanted us to go back to the lab for one more heel stick to check on Elliott's bilirubin levels and some tests for overall liver function. Before he got sick his direct bilirubin was kind of high and she had been concerned about it. They had monitored it in the hospital and it had spiked and then come down a little. Just to mention before we go any further- direct bilirubin (also known as conjugated bilirubin) being high is never considered normal. It is always a sign of a problem with the liver or the hepatic system.

We went to the lab on Tuesday the 17th. The results came back on Thursday the 19th. Our pediatrician called us right away because Elliott's direct bilirubin level was a 3.0. It should be 0. His GGT level (a test that shows liver functioning) was 320. It should be 100. She had already been in touch with a pediatric liver specialist- he is the director of the pediatric liver transplant program for the state of Arizona. He wanted us to take Elliott in for an abdominal ultrasound immediately, have a bunch of labs done and then meet with him ASAP. So, later that afternoon we went in for an ultrasound at Phoenix Children's Hospital. They took over 70 images of Elliott's stomach, gallbladder, spleen, liver, bile ducts, intestines and rectum. He also started Elliott on a new medication that helps to flush bile out of the liver. The medication has to be compounded (actually created by the pharmacist), so it wasn't ready until Saturday.

This whole time, since our pediatrician called on Thursday the 19th, the concern and the urgency for all of this was that Elliott could have a condition known as biliary atresia. Biliary atresia is a congenital disorder that causes the bile ducts inside the liver, outside of the liver or both inside and outside to become blocked. When bile cannot leave the liver it causes the liver to die from damage and cirrhosis. Children with this condition must have surgery to connect the liver to the intestines by 8 weeks of age or they will die by age one. Even with the surgery there is a 50% chance they will need a liver transplant by age 5 and an 85% chance that they will need a liver transplant by age 20.

So obviously we were just out of our minds with grief and fear that Elliott had this. I called my mom on the way to the ultrasound and was so upset that she jumped in her car and was at our house before we even got home. We spent the whole weekend just devastated, thinking that Elliott had this and was going to need surgery very soon and live a life full of hospitalizations, sickness and pain. It was a very dark place to be, especially while trying to hide it from Spencer.

On Monday the 23rd I took Elliott to the lab where they took out about half of his blood (through an arm draw) because they were running so many tests. We got the levels back and his GGT level was slightly down (296) but his bilirubin was up to 3.6. We tried not to panic even more but it was hard not to.

On Thursday the 26th we met with Dr. Miloh, the liver specialist. It had been 7 days since we had been alerted to the possibility of a problem so Michael and I were whipped up into a frenzy of worry and panic. Dr. Miloh is awesome. He spent a lot of time with us going over the lab results and just generally investigating all possibilities. He said that his gut feeling, based on medical experience working with kids with biliary atresia, was that Elliott did not have it. His levels would be higher and he would be sicker. But obviously a gut feeling does not make for a diagnosis. The plan was to get more labs the next week, do another abdominal ultrasound in a week and meet with him in a week.

This past Monday, the 30th, I took Elliott back to the lab for another blood draw, again out of his arm. His GGT was down to 255 and his bilirubin was 3.5. Yesterday we went back for another ultrasound in the morning and met with Dr. Miloh in the afternoon. Dr. Miloh said that, based on the latest ultrasound and numbers, there is less than a 1% chance of Elliott having biliary atresia. The only way to be 100% certain is to do a liver biopsy, but we all feel good about 99% certain. Elliott's GGT level would be in the thousands by this point (7 weeks) if he had it. That's the good news. The bad news is that there is still something wrong with Elliott's liver and we still don't know what. His blood tests show that he has cholestasis, meaning a condition in which the flow of bile from the liver is blocked. Cholestatis is not a disesase. It is a symptom of many diseases. We have to figure out which one is causing Elliott's.

There was the possibility that his liver was just irritated by the sepsis and that caused his numbers to spike, but Dr. Miloh feels, at this point, that Elliott would be more recovered by now. The plan from here is to repeat labs in 3 weeks and meet with Dr. Miloh again in 3 weeks. He said there are a million possibilities of what could be going on. None of them are as serious or as time sensitive as the biliary atresia.

While we are thrilled that Elliott does not have biliary atresia, we are back to being frustrated because we do not know what he has. I have spent about 18 hours a day over the last 9 weeks on my phone doing internet research- first during my hospitalization, then during Elliott's and now this whole liver thing. It is exhausting. At this point I feel like I could be a liver specialist if I had a medical degree.

When Spencer was 5 months old he got a cold. He had a runny nose. I thought I would die I was so worried about him. If I wasn't in such a state of worry and panic all the time I would laugh at myself for being so concerned about minor incidences with Spencer. Even his non-stop colic and crying for 4 months seems preferable to "this".

After out first appointment with Dr. Miloh we were standing at the reception desk making our follow up appointment when a code blue was called over the loud speaker. It happened to be in the outpatient area where we were. About 30 people came rushing in from all over. I just stood there and burst out in tears. Some mother was back there watching her kid not breath. I have been that mother. It is not anything that I wish on anybody ever.

I was really, really concerned yesterday because Elliott had only gained 1 ounce in the last week. Babies and kids with liver problems have difficulty gaining weight because their livers cannot process the calories and fat in food. There is a possibility that we might have to put him on a special diet. Dr.Miloh (who is triple certified as a hepatologist, a gastroenterologist and a pediatrician) wasn't concerned at all about the weight gain though, so I am trying to tell myself that if he's not worried, I shouldn't be either. In reality Elliott has gained 1 pound 5 ounces in a month (Jan 2-Feb 2) and he had gained 2 inches in 6 weeks. He is growing.

I know this is a whole huge thing to put out there. I'm sorry. It's gotten hard to keep track of "who knows" and "who doesn't". We really didn't want to say anything until we knew for sure about the biliary atresia. Now that we do we need to move on. And of course I will fill you in once we know anything. It looks like that won't be for about 3 weeks though. So frustrating.

I know this was a bummer of a post. Here are some cute pictures of the boys to lighten the mood a bit.

Tucson

2012-01-30T16:41:00.001-07:00

My 94 year old grandmother fell the day after we brought Elliott home from the hospital (from being born, not from the sepsis) and broke her hip in 4 places. She had surgery a few days later and was transferred to a rehab facility later that week.

She's not doing so great. She is very weak and has stopped making progress, so the rehab place is basically kicking her out of there. They say she will never walk again and she is unable to do even basic tasks like dressing herself, because of her muscle atrophy.

With this in mind we decided to take a trip to Tucson to see her. We went on Saturday, were there for less than 24 hours and spent less than 30 minutes with her, but I feel better knowing that she got to see Elliott in person. My family had never told her about Elliott being in the hospital when he was sick. We broke the news to her. She took it well.

On the way.

Elliott's first trip out of Maricopa County and the furthest he's ever been from home.

With my grandma at the rehab facility.

She was pretty darn tickled to see him and hold him.

Spencer flat out refused to sit right next to her for a picture.

On Saturday evening my Aunt Karen and Uncle Terry came over for dinner. I didn't get any pictures with them.

Elisa came over on Saturday night and Sunday morning. This is Sunday.

Elisa had never given Spencer his Christmas present. He was delighted to be able to open it.

Elliott took a little nap right before we left.

A few more comparisons!

Spencer and Elliott on their first trips to Tucson. Spencer was 10 days old. Elliott was 6 weeks. I am sick to my stomach thinking about how we took Spencer down there at 10 days.

First time being held by Great Grandma Girl. Spencer had met her before this picture was taken, but she hadn't held him. He was 7 weeks old.

Recreation of the daddy picture. Spencer, again, was 7 weeks and Elliott was 6 weeks.

6 weeks

2012-01-27T21:57:00.000-07:00

Pure sweetness

1/27/12

Michael thinks I am awful to share this one.

Spencer did his own hair for the occassion.

I remembered the forgotten Spencer story. Actually, Spencer is the one who remembered. I thought I'd share it here in case people don't go back and look at the previous post.

Michael had some, um, gas. Spencer told him that he needed to go to the tooter doctor.

That's it. I'm done. Good night everybody.

Spencer stuff, nursing and Pinterest

2012-01-26T22:47:00.000-07:00

This post is kind of all over the place with topics. You're cool with that, right?

I had three funny stories to tell about Spencer. I had written the blog post in my head. It was hilarious. Then I waited too long (we've had a difficult week) and now I can't remember the third story. Like, I really can not remember any part of it, not that I just forgot the details or the dialogue. I'll probably remember at 3:00 in the morning when I'm up with Elliott.

Anyway, Spencer has been saying the funniest things lately. And not just funny things. He's also saying intelligent things and higher order thinking things and abstract thinking things. It's amazing. Maybe because I am now comparing him to a 6 week old, but he just seems so much older and mature.

Funny story #1

Spencer was practicing writing his whole name (first, middle and last) on the blackboard while Elliott was nursing. Spencer was having a really hard time with the A and the Y. I couldn't exactly get up and write them for him so he was getting frustrated. Then I was thinking it was a good thing he's going to do preschool again and not start kindergarten in the fall. His birthday is right after the cut-off and I have agonized over starting him next year or not. I had been feeling really good about giving him another year before starting. Then, in that moment, I doubted myself again, because what if he is bored in another year. So I asked him if he wanted to learn how to play a musical instrument. He thought about it. Like really thought about it. Then he said yes. I asked what kind of instrument. Just as I said "violin"? he said "a tuba".

Can you just picture Spencer (in the 10th percentile for height and 20th for weight) playing this thing? How does he even know what a tuba is? I've certainly never said that word to him.

Funny Story #2

My favorite place to nurse is in the recliner in our bedroom. It's the most comfortable chair, the arms are perfectly spaced and it supports my back. Since it is in our room I brought a bunch of Spencer's toys in there to keep him occupied. We pretty much don't leave our room until around 11 am every day. So, I was nursing Elliott and Spencer was playing with his toys. He was doing something sciency. I don't remember what exactly. I told him I thought he should be a doctor when he grew up. He asked why and I said because he was smart and he would be good at it. He thought about it and said, "No thanks. I think I will just get a job doing construction and painting."

Aim high, baby. Aim high.

While I was typing this he came over to me, put a toy fishing pole on my arm and said he needed to take my blood pressure. There is still hope.

If I remember the third story I'll come back and put it here.

When Spencer was a baby I watched a lot of tv while I was nursing. It was all I did. During that time Michael mentioned that he had never seen The Shining and I was able to tell him that it was on TV on Bravo at 3:00 the next Thursday. That's too much TV watching. I no longer have that luxury because I don't want Spencer watching all that TV.

This time around I am on my phone all the time. Facebook got old fast. Then I remembered pinterest. I joined a couple of months ago, but hadn't done much on it after initially setting up my boards. No more. I'm addicted. I love pinterest. I have Elliott's first birthday party all planned out.

The only disappointing thing is that on my phone I can only repin stuff. No original pins until they invent an app for droids.

I've found some of the coolest activities for kids. Last weekend we took a bar of ivory soap, cut it into fourths and microwaved one chunk. It was awesome.

Elliott is going to be 6 weeks old tomorrow. I still feel like I can't put him down. I think that I will recover from his first 4 weeks of life in the next 4 years. I just want to hold him for forever. Megan let me borrow her moby wrap. It's OK, but I'm not enthralled. We have a snugli, but I worry about it's non-ergonomicness. We thought about getting an Ergo, but I was put off by the cost and the fact that the baby can never face out. So, I did some research and found the Belle Baby Carrier. It is ergonomic, comes with an infant insert, is cheaper than the Ergo and the baby can face out. Pretty excited to get it delivered next week.

One more funny from Pinterest

Comparisons

2012-01-20T11:28:00.000-07:00

You're not supposed to compare your kids. Every baby is different and a good parent embraces and cherishes those differences.

I don't care.

I just had to do some picture comparisons. In all of them Spencer is on the left and Elliott is on the right.

In the hospital right after birth. First diaper.

First monthly picture on day of birth

With mommy on day of birth

Going home at 2 days old

First time in the car seat- 2 days old

First picture with Gramme

First picture with Grandpa

First picture with Grandma

(Papa was too nervous to hold Elliott in the hospital so I don't have a picture of the two of them)

First picture with Uncle Nick. Spencer was about 6 weeks old. Elliott was 2 days.

First picture with Uncle Nathan. Spencer was 5 weeks old. Elliott was 2 weeks.

Blocks- 2 days old

In the co-sleeper

(side note: Elliott has already spent 150% more time in the co-sleeper compared to Spencer)

First sponge bath. Spencer was 3 days. Elliott was 7 days.

First time wearing pants. Spencer was 5 weeks. Elliott was 1 week.

First time in the swing. Spencer was 3 weeks. Elliott was almost 2 weeks. They both disliked it.

First time on the lion gym. Elliott was about 1 week younger.

Calendars

Spencer was due on October 5th and was born on September 6th. Elliott was due on January 18th and was born on December 16th.

I will never know what it's like to go full term in a pregnancy.

More from the hospital and Due Date

2012-01-18T22:05:00.001-07:00

The last (awful) post I wrote about the hospital had all pictures from my phone. I wanted to share a few more from my actual camera.

Wednesday, the 4th during the baptism.

The priest, Father Arthur, was about 14 years old. Not really, but he was probably around 30. He's the youngest Catholic priest I've ever met.

Later that day

Thursday the 5th

napping with Gramme

Friday the 6th

Spencer had to have another monthly picture in another hospital.

4 years 4 months

The "bed" Michael slept on for 10 nights. You can't see with all the bedding, but the "mattress" is the hard bench cushions. I slept part time with him and part time in the world's most uncomfortable chair with Elliott. My hips will never be the same after our stay here. Permanent bone bruises, I think.

Saturday the 8th

Resting with daddy.

Wearing hospital socks

Sorry to force a breastfeeding photo on all of you. It doesn't really show anything though, so you shouldn't be too offended.

This is what I did pretty much non-stop from Friday the 6th until we left on Thursday the 12th.

Our PICU room

Elliott in the swing that we finally thought to ask for on Tuesday the 10th. We had a baaaaad night the night before and were exhausted and we got him to sleep in this for 2 hours that night. Then he never went in it again.

Tuesday the 10th

Tuesday the 10th when we finally thought to ask for an infant seat. One of the hardest things was that we couldn't really move with Elliott since he was hooked up to so much stuff. It was nice to have a new option for where to put him.

We finally got kicked out of the PICU at about 10 pm the night of the 10th. Elliott was moved to our new room in a wagon. It was bizarre and funny.

There was no bassinet in the new room and Elliott looked bizarre in this huge crib.

More relaxing with daddy on Wednesday the 11th

Our view from our room on the 5th floor (the non-PICU room). The flight path for the airport is just north of the hospital. I sat there for 2 days and watched a new plane go by, literally, every minute. It is shocking how many planes take off and land from Sky Harbor.

Our last day. Thursday the 12th. We were so, so glad to be out of there!

Also:

Today, January 18th, was to be my due date. Elliott missed the memo, however, and is 4 weeks 5 days old.

One Month

2012-01-16T21:00:00.002-07:00

When Spencer was born I sent out an email announcement to everyone I knew. One of my friends wrote back and said that one of her favorite things was when she got email updates and pictures past just the birth announcement. With that in mind I sent updates with cute little stories and pictures every month. Then I started blogging when Spencer was 15 months old and his monthly pictures and updates went on the blog.

I am beyond thrilled to be able to do Elliott's 1 month update today. There were about 24 hours in the hospital where I didn't actually think we would make it to today.

Elliott got a bath this morning, I picked his outfit, we dressed him in this adorable sweater, posed him, photographed him and then changed his clothes into a more baby friendly get-up.

Date:

January 16, 2012

Weight:

Elliott was 6 pounds 13 ounces at birth. He went down to 6 pounds 2.5 ounces before he started gaining weight (between 7 and 9 days old). We took him to the pediatrician today for his follow-up to being discharged from the hospital. He was 7 pounds 2.5 ounces. He gained a pound in a little less than a month. Pretty impressive, given how sick he was during a chunk of that time.

Sleep:

Elliott was pretty much asleep until he was 19 days old. First, he was a premature newborn which made him extra sleepy to begin with. Second, at 3 days old he developed jaundice. Then he was in a bilirubin coma for 3 days. Just as he was really getting over the jaundice he developed the UTI and sepsis. We felt like we really didn't see him at his most alert until he had been on the IV antibiotics for 3 days.

Since we have been home from the hospital and we are settling into a routine, his routine (for the last 3 days) is: He sleeps for 2-3 hours at night with one 3-4 hour chunk, normally in the early morning hours. He sleeps in the co-sleeper at night until around 4-5 am and then he wants to snuggle. Then he goes in my arms. He has 2-3 periods of good alertness during the day. He has been napping with us during the day. I know it is a fine line we are walking here with him getting too used to being held while he sleeps. We do not want to repeat what happened with Spencer, but then part of me says- screw it. He almost died and if I want to hold my beautiful baby I will hold him, dammit.

Movement:

Elliott is surprisingly strong given his prematurity and illness. He tries really hard to hold his head up and can do it for 4-5 seconds before his neck gives out and his head crashes back down. He can roll from his back to his side.

Speech/Language:

Elliott is a grunter. He gets really mad and grunts really loud while he is being swaddled, but then he relaxes and enjoys the cocoon. We didn't really hear him cry until we were in the hospital for a few days. I think before then he was just too sleepy and weak and sick. The most miraculous thing about him is that he will cry and then STOP when we pick him up. That never happened with Spencer. Elliott makes the sweetest noises while he sleeps. They sound like content sighs.

Sweet Remembrances:

I am going to force myself to list some because the overwhelming theme of the month was not sweet, nor anything I want to remember.

1) The overwhelming support of our friends and family during a very difficult time.

2) The wonderful medical care we received at Cardon Children's Hospital. They saved Elliott's life.

3) Spencer being so excited to be a big brother and dealing with us being gone at the hospital for 10 days.

4) Our first Christmas with Elliott.

5) Taking Elliott to our 10th Anniversary dinner.

Food:

The hospital had a policy that premature babies be given a small amount of formula after nursing in order to keep their glucose levels up. We didn't do it once and the nurse yelled at us. So, while we were in the hospital Elliott got about 1/2 to 1 ounce of formula after each time I nursed. Once we were home, starting on day 3, it has been only breast milk. We went through 2 phases where Elliott quit nursing- once for 3 days during the jaundice and once for 2 days in the hospital. I pumped like mad during those times. Elliott has been a champion nurser for 11 days now. He eats between 9 and 12 times a day, so today we returned the hospital pump I had rented. I was not sad to see it go.

Mood:

So far so good. No excessive crying so it appears Elliott is not following after his brother with colic. Premature babies can develop colic up to 2-3 weeks after their due dates though, so I'm still holding my breath a little bit. I'm so glad he is here though that I'd just deal with it if he had colic.

Likes/Dislikes:

Elliott likes being held by mommy and daddy. He sometimes likes to sit in his infant chair. He likes bath time. He doesn't mind his car seat and being in the car, but he wants the car moving. He cries at red lights. He tried out the lion gym for the first time yesterday and it occupied him for about 10 minutes.

Ellliott does not like the swing. Poor swing. Neither of our kids were/are fans.

The lion gym- yesterday

Dear Elliott,

What can we possibly say on your 1 month birthday? Your birth was truly miraculous after such a trying time for mommy in the hospital on bed rest. You were just perfect and we were so glad to have you join the family. It was such a delight to bring you home from the hospital. Your big brother was so excited and we, your parents, were thrilled. Then you got jaundice and you were so, so sleepy. It was stressful but you perked up after a couple of days of bili-light treatment. Then, when you were 17 days old you turned blue. We rushed you to the Emergency Room. The next couple of days were awful. The worst of our entire lives. We thought we were going to lose you when you were 18 days old. The fact that you lived and are going to be fine is a miracle. We thank God for you every day and will try our hardest to 1) not be too overly protective and paranoid as you grow and 2) show you just how much we love you every day of your life.

Love, Mommy and Daddy

napping after his 1 month photo shoot

Dec. 26- Jan. 2

2012-01-15T17:13:00.000-07:00

I swear I am not going to blog about every single day of Elliott's life. As of right now I am caught up and we can continue on with more cuteness and fun stories and less every day boringness.

I wrote that at about 5:00 pm on Monday, January 2nd. Four hours later we were rushing Elliott to the Emergency Room and five hours after that he quit breathing. Now I feel like I do need to blog about every day of his life because, although his life was precious to begin with, it is even more precious after his very existence was threatened.

Monday, December 26th

Michael's parents came up from Tucson and we had Christmas #2.

Elliott tried out his new swaddlepod blanket. It didn't work very well. We might try it again now that he's gained a pound.

Love a baby in a milk coma.

On a side note- this is my favorite nursing pillow. It took a lot of trial and error to find it with Spencer. I hate nursing with boppy pillows. What a joke. This pillow is the right size and correct firmness. It took me 2 whole weeks after we brought Elliott home to put a pillow case on it.

Tuesday, December 27th

Bath time

All clean

Wednesday, December 28th

Chelsea and Laura drove up from Tucson to see me. Karen also came over (she lives here in the Valley). Laura and I were supposed to have our kids 1 month apart. Elliott, with his other plans, will now be 2 months older than Samantha.

Elliott wore old man pants.

Thursday, December 29th

Our 10th wedding anniversary. Not exactly how we planned on spending the day.

Elliott tried out the swing again.

We took a nice nap together.

Michael and I mustered all of our energy and got ready for a "fancy" dinner out.

Elliott came with us. We ate really, really fast.

My brothers took Spencer to Jump Street, a jumping castle/trampoline wonder land, while we were at dinner. I'm not sure who had more fun- Spencer or the uncles.

Uncle Nathan held Elliott. His response was: "this makes me very uncomfortable".

Uncle Nick showed him how it was done.

Friday, December 30th

Elliott took a snooze in his chair.

And, while we worked on removing Christmas decorations, also napped in the travel crib that Spencer never, ever used. I had actually never even taken it out of the package seeing as Spencer didn't sleep anywhere but on me until he was 2 years old.

Saturday, December 31st

Spencer requested a picture with his brother.

Elliott on the last day of his birth year.

We have a family tradition (started the year that Spencer was born) of eating BBQ on New Year's Eve. This year we ordered in. I also drank half of a beer. It was a huge deal.

Sunday, January 1st

We wanted to go for a walk as a family. We got Elliott all situated in the car seat and then went to strap it on the Sit N Stand. That's when we realized that despite my diligent research and reading about 100 reviews we realized that the Chicco Key Fit does not actually work with the Sit N Stand.

We did take the walk. Elliott just went in the moby wrap instead.

Monday, January 2nd

This was taken just after noon. I was beginning to suspect that something was wrong. Elliott was extra sleepy and extra fussy. For about 2 hours I convinced myself that it was the beer I had on New Year's Eve and that I had caused liver damage to his little body. After having been through everything we have and knowing about the sepsis, I can now see that this was the very beginning of his being very, very sick.

It just breaks my heart.

It was the night of the 2nd that we took him to the ER and that whole saga began to unfold.

Home!

2012-01-13T23:37:00.000-07:00

We are home!

We have actually been home for about 26 hours, but I wanted to enjoy my home (and especially my bed) a bit before jumping on the computer.

We also had the little issue of our Christmas tree still being up. Luckily we had taken down all the other decorations before we landed back in the hospital, but the tree with all its trimmings was there to greet us on January 12th. It's down now too.

Elliott is sleeping peacefully in daddy's arms right now. We're all headed to bed soon. I wanted to do a quick update first.

The last time I updated was on Sunday. This is a little rundown of what happened during this week:

Monday the 9th

Elliott had a PICC line placed. He had already had 2 IVs and the antibiotics are really harsh on veins, so the doctors didn't want to have to keep starting IVs on him. A PICC line is like an IV, but it lasts longer. It was not fun to watch them putting it in. They gave Elliott a little sedative to keep him still, but it was still hard to watch him being held down and poked. It also took a long time- more than an hour.

Tuesday the 10th

Elliott had the Voiding Cysto-Urethrogram (VCUG) test. They gave him a catheter, filled his bladder with contrast dye, pulled the catheter out and then poured warm water on him to get him to pee. As he peed they took a bunch of x-rays. We were with him the whole time. He did great. They had him strapped down on a thing that can only be described as a rotisserie spit rod so they could flip him back and forth to see both ureters. He didn't like being strapped down and didn't like being flipped, but luckily it was all very fast. He had no urinary reflux. Since the renal ultrasound was negative and this test was negative it means his UTI was just random. There was no specific cause. I find that to be scarier and more unsettling than there being a specific cause. We also found out that UTI's in newborns are not actually rare. They are the most common type of infection in a newborn. Whoever told us they were rare was totally wrong.

Elliott was also weighed on this day. He had gained 6 ounces in 5 days. I hadn't pumped or given him any expressed breast milk in those 5 days so that was all breastfeeding. Once he got a few doses of that antibiotic in him, really got over the jaundice and perked up from the anesthesia that kid went to town.

Wednesday the 11th

Elliott had a repeat EEG. The neurologist said that there was way less seizure activity, but he still saw some, especially when they flashed the strobe light. He did not believe that Elliott had a seizure disorder or that it will be long lasting. He thinks that there is still some residual irritation of the brain caused by the sepsis. He also mentioned that he hardly ever does a repeat EEG after only one week and that if we had waited longer he is sure there would have been no seizure activity. The plan is to leave Elliott on the phenobarbital for 6 weeks and then do another EEG. The dose will stay the same for the whole 6 weeks. Usually the dose is gradually increased for it to remain effective, so by keeping it the same we will be weaning Elliott from it as he grows. He also mentioned that if he had seen this EEG knowing nothing about the patient he would be tempted to call it normal. That made us feel better. I hate that we have to leave him on medication, but the neurologist is convinced that Elliott stopped breathing those 6 times because of the seizures, so we obviously don't want that.

Thursday the 12th

Elliott needed to get 3 more doses of antibiotics. They reduced the time in between each one (six instead of eight hours) so he got the last one at 6 pm. As soon as it was done going in (like 1 second later) they came in to remove the PICC line. The worst part of that was them pulling the tape off. He WAILED.

I almost couldn't breathe during the last seconds of the antibiotic dripping in. I was just so convinced that something was doing to go wrong and he wouldn't be discharged.

Once they removed the PICC line he had to be observed (for bleeding) for one hour. There was none. Then we just left. It was pretty anticlimactic. Which is good.

We got home around 8 pm. We were all in bed by 11 pm. I have never minded nursing my babies during the middle of the night (although I did mind Spencer screaming all night long until he was 4 months old) so I was just so appreciative to be in my own bedroom whenever Elliott woke up.

Now that we're home, thankful to once again have a healthy baby, we are going to try to get back to some sort of routine. Michael is finally going to go back to work after taking a whole month off. I am going to try to figure out how to be the mother of two. Ginger is going to live in continued fear that we will all up and disappear at any moment. The poor dog has lost me twice in the past 5 weeks and doesn't seem to trust me any more.

The day we left for the Emergency Room I had been loading pictures to do my last "catch-up blog". I still plan on doing it, then one more post about the hospital stay and then finally, finally, finally we can move on with cuteness and good stories.

We gave Elliott a real bath today. We felt like we needed to wash away all the hospitalness. This is him after. He's 4 weeks old. He won't be one month until the 16th (isn't that weird how the weeks and months don't align?) and he's not even due until the 18th (isn't that even weirder?) so there will be some fun posts about those days.

The Hospital Again

2012-01-08T16:30:00.002-07:00

Once again, for those of you that I know in real life and on facebook, you know about this already. For those of you that read my blog but don't know me in real life, this is the first you have heard of all of this.

You may have been wondering where I have been for the last week. Maybe you thought I was just busy with a newborn and a 4 year old. The answer is no. We have been in the hospital with Elliott for the last week.

I am trying to write this as quickly as possible in between feedings, so I apologize if it is jumpy or not coherent.

Last Monday, January 2nd, when he was 17 days old Elliott missed a feeding at about 2:30 in the afternoon. He was just too, too sleepy and I could not wake him up. It had been about 10 days since he had really missed a feeding. I was concerned about it. I pumped, we fed him what I pumped and then he nursed "ok" around 5:00. He was also extra fussy that afternoon. At 8:00 I woke him up again and nursed him again. About 10 minutes in he turned really pale, almost white, and the area around his mouth and across the bridge of his nose turned blue. Then his fingernails and toenails turned dark purple. We freaked out. Then I pulled him off and his color returned to normal within a couple of minutes. We debated for about 2 minutes about what to do- wait and see (we had a doctor appointment the next day and had already talked to the after hours nurse at the doctor's office because of his sleepiness and extra fussiness) or go to the ER. We ultimately decided that a 2 week old turning blue was in no way normal and we needed to go to the ER.

In hindsight I am sick to my stomach that we even debated for 2 minutes because Elliott would have for sure died that night if we had not brought him in.

We loaded everyone in the car and I called Megan on the way. She came and met us and took Spencer home with her for a sleepover. When we got to the ER there was a long line to check in. Michael cut in front of everyone and demanded that we be seen immediately because we had a newborn who turned blue. They took us back right away, but by then Elliott looked totally normal. They checked him out and said that sometimes babies with reflux can turn bluish while they are nursing. They were going to admit us to just monitor him overnight and we would probably go home by the next day.

They took us up to a room in the oncology area, because they were very empty that night. They hooked him up to a bunch of monitors, Michael and I sort of grumbled about it being annoying that we had to stay overnight, I nursed Elliott again and we went to bed around 1:00. At 3:00 am 6 nurses came running into our room, scooped Elliott up and started pounding on his chest. They pulled him out of the bassinet, put him on the bed and started forcing oxygen from a high flow mask into him. He had stopped breathing and his heart nearly stopped. The nurses never left his side because this happened 6 times over the next hour. They took his temperature when they first came in the room and it was normal. Within an hour it had spiked to 103.

During that time (from 3:00-5:00) they put him on oxygen, started an IV and took a chest x-ray. At 5:00 they moved us to the pediatric intensive care unit. It was obvious to all that this was way more than acid reflux.

Once we were in the PICU they did a spinal tap, took a nasal swab, inserted a catheter to take a urine sample and drew a bunch of blood. It was awful to watch all of that, but Elliott was so sick he barely budged for any of it.

Once they were done taking all of the samples, they started him on two different antibiotics and an antiviral. They didn't know what was wrong with him so they had to cover everything. We were told that it would be 24 hours before the first results were back and 72 hours before everything was back.

Later that afternoon they did an EEG to check for seizure activity and an ultrasound of his brain to check for bleeding, swelling and problems with his ventricles. The ultrasound came back normal but the EEG showed major seizure activity on both sides of the brain. Because of that the neurologist ordered an MRI for the next day and started him on anti-seizure medication.

That first day (Tuesday) was the worst day of my entire life. We spent 24 hours thinking that Elliott was going to die and if he didn't he would be seriously disabled. The only reason I can talk about it now, 7 days later, is because we know so much more at this point. I was actually, literally, unable to speak for 3 days. I pretty much cried continuously until Wednesday night.

On Wednesday morning the first of the cultures came back. The spinal tap was clear. He did not have meningitis. The blood cultures showed the same type of bacteria in his urine and his blood. He had a urinary tract infection that spread to his blood, so he had sepsis. Sepsis is very serious in a newborn. It is the leading cause of death in a premature baby after the first week of life. We were obviously devastated by this news, but at least it was information.

At about 9:30 on Wednesday Elliott went in for the MRI. He had to be sedated because he could not move at all. I thought that it would be mild sedation, but he actually was put under general anesthesia and did not wake up until 10:00 that night. He was on an IV getting fluids the whole time but it was horrible not being able to nurse him or feed him in any way during that whole time. The results of the MRI were ready by the afternoon. Everything was normal. No structural problems.

That day my mom asked if we wanted to have Elliott blessed by a priest. We spoke to the chaplain and he said that the priest was actually in the hospital. I had asked the chaplain if it was possible for the priest to baptise Elliott and he didn't think he would. The priest was there within 20 minutes and we asked if he would do a blessing and he said of course and asked if we wanted him baptised. So, on Wednesday afternoon Elliott was baptised in the hospital. We are going to have a real ceremony later when the godparents are present and we can do the gown and the candle and everything.

On Thursday the cultures came back showing that the bacteria in his urinary tract and blood was E.Coli. They also did an ultrasound of his urinary tract to check for obstructions and structural anomalies. They found none.

Because there are no structural problems we are going to have a test that will show if Elliott is having urinary reflux. Sometimes babies and kids will have urine back up from their bladder back into the kidneys and that can cause a UTI. It is very, very important for us to find out why Elliott got the UTI because we have to make sure he doesn't get another one. A UTI in a newborn is very rare.

Since Thursday everything has been very stable. Elliott still wasn't nursing well, but he has been since Friday. Since Saturday he has been cluster nursing around the clock because 1) I think he is feeling better and 2) he is making up for all the time he didn't eat. He still has the IV but he hasn't had any fluids since Thursday. It is only being used for meds.

One of the theories that the neurologist threw out early in the week before any test results were back was that Elliott might have a herpes infection. I do not have herpes so I was confused as to how this might be. They explained that herpes II is the STD, but herpes I is the type that caused cold sores and 80% of the adult population is infected with it. It can be passed to a newborn through casual contact and is just as devastating as the STD type. It has an 85% mortality rate and the babies that survive have major problems. I spent 3 days FREAKING out about that possibility. The neurologist thought it might be a possibility because of the seizures. Elliott had no other symptoms of it. We didn't find out for sure until Friday that there is no herpes infection, and actually, no viral infection at all. On Friday they removed him from the antiviral medication. They also removed him from one of the antibiotics because the final blood culture showed he only needed one.

The plan from here is that Elliott has to have 10 days of antibiotics. That puts us here until Thursday the 12th. He started with an IV in his arm. That one was starting to leak a little by Friday, so they put one in his ankle. Tomorrow, Monday, they are placing a PICC line, because the antibiotics are very harsh on his veins. He has 2 more doses of antibiotics before tomorrow. We are praying his IV lasts until then. They have to wait until Monday for the PICC line because he can't have any bacteria in his blood when they do it.

He is scheduled to have the urinary reflux test on Tuesday because he can't have any bacteria in his urinary tract when they do it. If he does have urinary reflux he needs to take a small dose of antibiotics everyday to prevent another UTI. Most kids outgrow the condition as they get bigger. If they don't it is a simple surgery once they are older.

Elliott will be having a repeat EEG on Wendesday, on day 9 of the antibiotics, to check for continued seizure activity. We are hoping and praying the seizures were caused by the sepsis and will be gone now that the sepsis is cleared up. If they are not we will have to investigate that Elliott actually has a seizure disorder unrelated to the illness. We'll deal with that if it happens.

I am writing all of this on the computer in the quiet room in the PICU. I loaded the pictures to blogger from my phone. For some reason the pictures come out horribly when I use that app to load them. They are all grainy and I can't center them. Sorry. We'll all deal.

I have no idea if I already said these things but I wanted to add a few more details, just so I know I covered everything. Elliott has been off the oxygen since Tuesday afternoon. He has had only 1 little episode of apnea (on Thursday night) and he recovered on his own. Other than that, his breathing and heart rate have been great all week. The pediatrician assures us that the sepsis does not put him at greater risk for developmental delays. If he had had meningitis it would be more of a concern. The antibiotics do not put him at risk for hearing loss.

Elliott had not passed his hearing screening in his left ear in the hospital when he was born. They rescreened him yesterday and he passed.

Also, they tested his bilirubin level when we first came in and it was elevated again, most likely due to the sepsis. They started him on the bili light again and as of Thursday his levels were finally within normal limits.

Michael just called and Elliott is starting to stir so I have to go feed him. Sorry this was all over the place. It's been a hell of a week.

These are the pictures I wanted to share.

Elliott at 4 am Tuesday morning before we were moved to the PICU. I see now just how sick he was.

Tuesday morning in the PICU

Tuesday afternoon

Wednesday- being baptised

Thursday- finally awake after the anesthesia the previous day

Friday afternoon after he finally started nursing again

Friday evening, I think

Saturday- after a bath while his hearing was being rescreened

Saturday afternoon- sleeping peacefully. I finally relented and let Elliott have a pacifier because the nurses told me that babies in the PICU need something to help soothe themselves. I'm already trying to cut back on it.

Sunday- with daddy

I want to mention really quickly that Michael has been with me and Elliott at the hospital this entire time. He is my rock. I could not handle this without him. I would have died on about day 2 without him. He is the best husband and the best father in the world. If I am strong it is only because he is my partner through all of this.

Christmas Day 2011

2012-01-02T19:44:00.000-07:00

Our Christmas Day got off to a late start. Spencer got up at 9:00 and despite it being Christmas morning, was happy to snuggle in our bed for a while and watch some cartoons while I finished nursing.

Then it was into the living room to discover what Santa had left.

Elliott is very advanced and bought this game for Spencer.

Cranky was Spencer's favorite gift.

Even though all he talked about the whole month of December was getting a talking James.

Spencer was kind enough to open Elliott's gifts.

Including 3 (yes 3) baby's first Christmas ornaments. Well, one of them is just the letter E.

The kids got dressed

Then it was off to my aunt and uncle's house.

I spent most of the time sitting with Elliott on my chest so I didn't take many pictures.

My cousin was kind enough to occupy Spencer's time with some wrestling.

And there was an awesome pile of leaves for jumping.

And that was it. Not even close to what we normally do, but nothing about this December was.

Christmas Eve 2011

2011-12-31T18:02:00.000-07:00

I know everyone else is doing their end of the year wrap-ups on their blogs today, but I am still playing catch up and have barely made it to Christmas Eve.

Michael and I were talking about Christmas plans after the amniocentesis on the 15th when it was looking more and more like I would be having Elliott on the 16th. All of a sudden we were facing me not being in the hospital on the 24th and 25th. We were talking to each other about how my mom thought we'd be able to come to Tucson as long as Elliott was healthy, but we didn't think that was a good idea. The perinatologist overheard us talking and told us it was a horrible idea to take the baby anywhere and begged us to stay home. It was also part of the pediatrician's orders upon discharge.

The morning of Christmas Eve we debated for about 2 minutes loading everything and everyone up in the car and just going. I think I would have been more tempted if it wouldn't have involved so much packing. Then we re-agreed it was a really bad idea.

So, this was the first Christmas Eve/Christmas Day ever that I have not spent with my parents and one or both of my brothers. It was the first Christmas of our marriage that Michael and I weren't in Tucson with our families. Spencer has never experienced a Christmas in our own house. We were actually responsible for the whole thing. It was weird.

Michael and Spencer went out to do some shopping on the morning of Christmas Eve. We needed groceries and I wanted Spencer to buy Elliott a present. Elliott had really started nursing the previous day and was nursing around the clock so we stayed home. Spencer found this Thomas drum while they were out and convinced Michael to buy it for him. What a delightful gift for me.

Once they were home we took a random picture of Elliott in a bucket just so we could tell him he did indeed fit in there once upon a time.

Then Spencer and I made cookies for Santa.

Elliott supervised.

I thought we'd give this basset hound to Santa.

Spencer had other ideas and picked it as the one he wanted for dessert.

Michael and Elliott lounged while I made dinner.

I was actually pretty proud of what I accomplished with an 8 day old- steak, loaded baked potatoes and creamed spinach.

After dinner we took pictures by the tree.

We don't know how to use the timer on the camera and without anyone to take a picture of us there is no family picture.

Then it was time to prepare for Santa.

Just in case you wanted a close up of the action.

Carrots for the reindeer.

Michael and I were up every 2-3 hours with Elliott, so we actually got an early preview of Santa's loot.

The chair was from us to Spencer. I've wanted to buy it for 4 years and decided it was my "reward" for my extended hospital stay.

We missed the actual arrival of Santa, but obviously he was hungry.

Part of me had really convinced myself that I would still be in the hospital for Christmas so I was so, so, so grateful to be home with my family, including a healthy baby.

Trying to catch up

2011-12-30T23:10:00.000-07:00

I'd like to catch up a bit before Elliott gets too old and I get too far behind. This is mostly just pictures.

Saturday, December 17th

3:00 am- chilling with daddy after nursing

In the morning

Elliott's poor feet after many heel sticks

Having his hearing screened. He never did pass in the left ear so we have a date with the audiologist coming up next week.

I was nursing the first time my parents came to see him so they didn't get their pictures taken until the next day.

Sunday, December 18th

Elliott's going home outfit. I bought it the day we found out he was a he.

Going home as a family of 4

Taking the first block pictures.

Some were OK

Some were less than OK

Then we broke out the swaddle and had success

Uncle Nick came for a very short visit that night

Monday, December 19th

Elliott had been doing a great job nursing the 2 days we were in the hospital. Then, at 9:30 on Sunday night he just quit. He just turned into a comatose baby and nothing we did could wake him up. We were literally putting a syringe down his throat and force feeding him because he was too knocked out to even suck from a syringe.

The pediatrician at our hospital told us to follow up with our pediatrician in 2-3 days, but I called at 8:00 on Monday and made an appointment for that same day.

We basically spent the day Monday sleeping, me pumping, force feeding and waiting.

Our pediatrician took one look at Elliott and said- he's got major jaundice. We went to the lab for a blood draw. We left the lab at 4:30 in the afternoon. By 7:30 that night we had a bilirubin belt delivered to us at our house. Elliott wore it continuously for the next 3 days, except when we went to the lab and pediatrician (which we did every day).

Tuesday, December 20th

Getting some light therapy.

Can you see the glow under his clothes?

We were (and still are) spending lots of time in jammies.

Wednesday, December 21st

A christmas outfit

My beautiful boys. This may be my most favorite picture ever.

And more light therapy

Thursday, December 22nd

Guess what? More light therapy.

I'm so mean for loving the look on Elliott's face.

And for posting this and being amused by it.

First time in the moby wrap. Just chilling.

Friday, December 23rd

In true 2nd child form Elliott got his first sponge bath on day 7. Spencer got his on day 3. In our defense we didn't want Elliott to spend any extra time out of the light belt and Friday was his first day not wearing it.

The good news is that his umbilical cord stump fell off right after the bath. Spencer was so glad. He thought it was really gross.

Then he chilled out with daddy.

OK. I feel a little better about getting up to this point. I'll do another post with Christmas Eve and Day and then another one for this past week and then we can just be all nice and in the present day.

Elliott's birth

2011-12-27T20:09:00.002-07:00

The last time I blogged about the loooooong progression leading up to Elliott's birth was the post called Major Development. It was all about the amniocentesis the night before he was born. If you care to, you can review it here.

I barely slept at all that Thursday night. I finally turned off the lights at 2 am and probably fell asleep between 3 and 4. Then I was up at 7, ate breakfast, showered and got ready. My mom, Michael and Spencer came to see me in the morning.

I had the misfortune that day of having the only nurse I didn't really like. I didn't not like her, I just didn't like her as much as I liked all the rest of my nurses. She was there the day I came in to triage and was the first nurse to check me, so I think I had a bad, stressful association with her.

We expected the results of the amnio around noon. At 11:30 I asked the charge nurse to come in, something I had never done. First I asked if the results were in yet. She called the lab and found out that the lab hadn't even sent the fluid to the other hospital until 8 am. It was doubtful the results would be in before about 3 or 4. Then I asked her if she could get me a new nurse if I were to deliver that day. I explained that I didn't have a problem with my nurse, I just had a bad association and didn't want her helping with the delivery. The charge nurse was very cool about the whole thing and promised to be discrete in changing nurses.

My mom, Spencer and Michael left around noon. Spencer had school and Michael was going to drop him off, then mail our Christmas cards. After they left I decided I was going to watch a movie while eating lunch and try to relax a little bit. I got less than 30 minutes into Morning Glory when my new nurse (one of my two favorite nurses) Allison came in and announced that the results of the amnio were in: lungs were mature and there was no sign of infection.

The plan was to start me on pitocin to really get my contractions going. The doctor didn't want to break my water until they got a good labor started. That meant I needed another new IV. I called Michael like 40 minutes after he had left and he came screeching back to the hospital.

We took these pictures to commemorate the last moments of my ever being pregnant.

Then we had to wait for the anesthesiologist to come in and get my IV started. He started that at about 2:00 and right after that they started the pitocin at a drip of "2" (whatever that means). I think I'm the only woman ever to get magnesium and terbutaline to stop labor and then 12 days later be given pitocin to induce labor.

At about 2:40 the pitocin was increased to a "4" and at 3:20 it was increased to a "6". My mom had been hanging out in the room with us and at 3:45 I told her she should probably get going. A friend was picking Spencer up from school and taking him to the park with her kids after school, but was dropping him off at about 4:15. My mom ignored me and proceeded to take a nap in the room. At 4:00 I had a sense that something was about to happen. I woke my mom up and with no uncertainty in my voice told her that she needed to stand up and walk out the door right now. By 4:02 she was gone and I really started feeling the contractions.

Then the pitocin was turned up to an "8". By 4:10 my contractions were starting to be completely out of control. They were coming in gigantic waves without much of a break in between. They were definitely a 10 on the pain scale. At about 4:13 Allison checked me and said that I was still at 8 cm. At 4:15 I started a contraction and it literally did not stop for 15 minutes. Right when the 15 minute contraction started I told Michael and Allison that I couldn't do this and I wanted an epidural afterall. Then I begged her to turn the pitocin back to a "6" which she said she couldn't do, but then did for me. That was the last thing I said and then I started screaming and screamed for 15 minutes straight.

At 4:25 Allison checked me again and I was dilated to 10. At that exact moment the people came in to do the epidural, but obviously that wasn't going to happen so she had them leave. Then she asked if I wanted to push. Well, at that point I didn't have much of a choice because my body was pushing without me even being in control of it. It was a crushing pain like I can't even describe.

In the meantime, the doctor that was supposed to deliver me was in the OR doing a C-section, so the rest of the staff was running around trying to find another doctor and getting the whole team from the NICU assembled.

At 4:29 (and yes, despite the horrendous pain I was in, I was keenly aware of the time throughout the entire process, because something about looking at the clock and being aware of how long it had been made me feel just the slightest like I was in control) I was laying on my right side, gripping the side rails with both my hands and screaming as loud as I ever have screamed in my life when a very gentle voice got right up in my face and said, "Natalie. You have to stop screaming right now. Your baby is not getting enough oxygen. So you need to breathe for me. Now." The doctor had arrived.

The team somehow got me rolled back onto my back and then had me start pushing. It was about 4:32. I gave one really good push and felt immediate relief. I was positive that I had just pushed Elliott out. Then they informed me that I had pushed out the amniotic sac intact. It was whole. Unbroken. How is that even possible?

So, I was terribly disppointed because I truly felt like I had already had him. They checked me and said that Elliott was still pretty high and I was going have to work hard to bring him down. So I gave one really good push to the count of 10 and then they stopped me and made me breath. Then I gave one tiny push to the count of about .5 and his whole body came flying out at 4:35 pm.

I don't know what they look for to see if a baby needs to be whisked away, but whatever it is they didn't see it. They put him immediately on my chest and I got to hold him for about a minute before they took him to be checked out. The neonatologist who I had been working with for 2 weeks came in, checked out Elliott and then came to talk to us. He said he was officially removing himself from our care and Elliott would be under the care of the regular nursery. He thanked me for making his job so much easier. It was nice to hear.

Elliott's apgar scores were 9 at 1 minute and 9 at 5 minutes. When they weighed him I thought I misunderstood and made them say his weight like 4 times before it really sunk in that my almost 5 week early baby was 6 pounds 13 ounces.

This is Elliott's 1st ever picture. He's about 10 minutes old.

Michael was a trooper through the whole thing, although there is very little you can do when your wife is in that much pain. It's not like holding my hand or reminding me to breathe was going to make me feel better.

I was able to nurse within the first 20 minutes and Elliott did great. Latched right on and stayed on for a good 15 minutes. They had to give him a little bit of formula to get his glucose level up, but once it was up it stayed up.

Then he was able to get his first bath.

That's Allison bathing him. Love her.

My parents came back to the hospital when Elliott was nursing for the first time. Then Spencer and Michael's parents came at about 7 that night.

Spencer was pretty thrilled to meet his little brother finally.

Later that night after everyone left and Michael and I were finally alone with our baby, we took the first monthly picture.

Birth Day

And that's the story.

It is now apparent that I suck at the end of pregnancy. For whatever reason I just can't seem to stay pregnant till full term despite having none of the risk factors or any other complications. One of my doctors told me that if we were to have another baby I would be considered a high risk pregnancy from the very beginning. I would have to be seen by a high risk doctor the entire time, they would sew my cervix shut at about 14 weeks and put me on automatic bed rest at 30 weeks. We were 99.9% certain that we were done with kids, but now we are 100% certain.

Our family feels very happy and very complete.

Maternity pictures

2011-12-23T20:24:00.002-07:00

I never got to have maternity pictures taken when I was pregnant with Spencer. I was waiting until the last month when I was really big. Then he was born 1 month and 1 day early. Go figure.

I had started thinking about and planning for maternity pictures this time around. I thought we'd do them during the holidays. You know. During my last month. Then I ended up in the hospital, banned from leaving.

On Wednesday, December 14th I was allowed to take my first wheelchair ride. I wanted to use it wisely, so I spent all morning trying to find somebody to come take some maternity pictures in the hospital garden. Finally a friend (who wanted to be anonymous- it's a long story) volunteered to do them.

I don't plan on every doing "anything" with these pictures- like framing them and hanging them on the wall. They are just nice to have.

You can't actually read the text of the sign. It says:

Baby- sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart.

Pictures from the hospital

2011-12-22T17:57:00.002-07:00

I wanted to share some pictures from the hospital. All of these were taken before Elliott was born. Obviously there will be another post with pictures after his birth. This was almost 2 weeks of my life that I want to forget, but never will.

This was on the 5th, the day I arrived. I was on a massive dose of magnesium.

This was the 6th. This picture proves my OCD. Spencer was 4 years-3 months old and I was adamant about not missing his monthly picture.

This was my room.

I wanted to take a hatchet to the bed by the end. I was also pretty sick and tired of the monitoring equipment on the left.

Where Michael slept a total of 3 nights.

The baby area

The "entryway"

My bathroom

My shower

Spencer playing in my bed on the 10th.

Spencer playing with his toys on the 13th.

Being goofy on the 14th

When Ginger came to visit on the 15th

After about a week I gave up hope of ever going home and started hanging Christmas cards on the wall.

That's it. Pretty boring. Sorry, it had to be done.

Christmas Picture(s)

2011-12-21T17:39:00.002-07:00

On Sunday, December 4th, Megan and her husband Scott came over to take our family Christmas picture. Scott has a fancy camera with all the fancy equipment and Megan has a knack for arranging us while getting Spencer to smile and Ginger to look at the camera. They are a dream team.

In only 6 trys we got this winner (that is in comparison to the 49 trys it took in 2010)

That afternoon I got on shutterfly and ordered our cards. I had won 3 separate blogging contests for 25 free cards (each). I had to create 2 additional shutterfly accounts to redeem all the codes, but I saved about $130 in doing so. Score!

The text of the card included a fun little list about our year:

2011- Another Year in Numbers

2- Trips to Disneyland (January and October)

1- Pregnancy

2- Trips to the ER (Spencer and Natalie)

1- Overnight hospital stay (Natalie)

5- Million episodes of Thomas the Train

1- Number of (ultrasound confirmed) babies in said pregnancy

0- Hakey babies born so far in 2011 (as of December 4th) (thank goodness)

1- Broken into car and stolen purse

10- Years of marriage (well, almost)

1- Cruise that will not be taken to celebrate 10th anniversary

45- Days left until the “official due date” (as of December 4th)

1- Unintentionally murdered fish. Sorry Paul.

1- Replacement fish. Welcome Piggy.

7- Letters in the names Michael, Natalie and Spencer

7- Letters in the name of our soon to be baby, Elliott

112- Hours spent agonizing over the selection of a 7-letter name

1- Number of Big Brother in Training classes Spencer completed

1- Billion blessings in our lives

______________________________

So you see, we were just tempting fate with how sure we were that Elliott would arrive closer to his due date. I especially like the one about me having an overnight hospital stay. Those 16 hours in Anaheim are nothing in comparison to the 13 nights I spent sleeping in a labor and delivery bed (FYI- a bed designed for giving birth is not comfortable for sleeping).

So, we all know what happened the very next day on December 5th.

Megan and Scott were so nice to come back yesterday and take a new family Christmas picture. Since 2007, when Spencer was born, I have been framing our picture and then setting the frames out each year.

2011 will now be known as the year with 2 frames.

And this one only took 5 trys.

Thanks Megan and Scott. Just another reason why we owe you a trip to Hawaii.

P.S. We really do owe you that trip for all of your support. But we really will never be able to afford it, so don't go buying sunscreen just yet. Ha!

December 20th

2011-12-20T20:58:00.001-07:00

We are trying to survive over here. We're adjusting to having 2 kids. It's a rough adjustment. Elliott has jaundice and isn't nursing well because his high levels of bilirubin make him super sleepy. That means lots of pumping for me. I hate, no, LOATHE, pumping. Elliott is being treated with a bilirubin light belt. Thank goodness it is a temporary thing and he should perk up soon. Our day revolves around pumping, feeding him (which takes forever because he constantly falls asleep during the feed and we have to wake him up), going to the lab for a blood draw, going to the pediatrician, keeping Spencer feeling important and loved and trying (trying) to get a little bit of sleep.

Yesterday my 94 year old grandmother fell and broke her hip. She had surgery today. It's an added element of stress, especially because we absolutely cannot go to Tucson to see her.

I want to blog, but there is just too much going on. I have resigned myself to the fact that my blogs will be all out of order for a while. Like, for example, it is easier for me to do today's blog than to write the story of Elliott's birth. I will write about everything I want to and share pictures, eventually. You might be hearing about Elliott's birth and our first day at home in April.
Without further adieu, I give you, December 20th:

December 20

2007

2008 2009

2010

2011

Elliott Stephen

2011-12-17T15:38:00.000-07:00

I got an app on my phone that lets me download pictures from my phone directly into my blog. I can't seem to figure out how to make the pictures go in order though. The OCD in me is going crazy but I really wanted to share some pictures.

Elliott Stephen was born on December 16, 2011 at 35 weeks 2 days gestation. He was a whopping 6 pounds 13 ounces. I'm very impressed as he is 4.5 weeks early. He was 19 inches. The official time was 4:35 pm. I did it without an epidural which is not something I would personally recommend or ever do again, but more on that later. His apgar scores were a 9 at 1 minute and a 9 at 5 minutes. He never needed oxygen, did not have to go to the NICU and was released from the "care" of the regular nursery within 18 hours (they had been checking on us in our room every 3 hours since birth). He latched really well and nursed really well until midnight when he became Sleepy Sleeperson, the mayor of Sleepy Town, and didn't want to wake up for anything.

We are due to be officially released on Sunday morning. I am debating going to Hobby Lobby before going home to buy Elliott a "My 1st Christmas" ornament, but that might be a little too crazy.

Once we are home tomorrow I hope to be blogging more. I laugh as I say that because I now have 2 children and 0 time available.

Brothers

Elliott was about 2 hours old.

About 1 hour old

This morning (Saturday) at about 10 am

Right after birth

Another shot at about an hour old

Major Development

2011-12-15T23:52:00.002-07:00

The perinatologist, Dr. B, came to see me around 8 pm tonight. He checked me (I hadn't been checked since 4 am on Wednesday the 7th) and I was still dilated to 8 cm. I was 90% effaced (I was 80% before) and at a 0 station (I was 1 before) (a 4 station would be very high and a -4 is when a baby is crowning. So Elliot is "engaged" in the pelvis).

I have been fighting an internal battle between wanting to keep Elliott inside as long as possible and really wanting to be home for Christmas. I think this is the worst time of year for this hospitalized bed rest to be happening. I feel like if it were in any other month I would have no qualms at all about just staying put. But for the last 5 days I have been swinging back and forth with- a) I can do it and b) I don't want to do it because I want to be at home with my family for Christmas.

I felt like a jerk of a mother for even thinking it, but I was going to propose my plan to Dr. B: I stay for 1 more week and then if nothing happens during that time I agree to be delivered on the 22nd at 36 weeks 1 day. That would be 2 days longer than my pregnancy with Spencer.

I never even got to bring up my plan. After Dr. B checked me he launched into his plan. He is concerned about the risk of infection, because I have been in advanced dilation for 11 days. He said that at this point the complications arising from infection far outweigh the risk of prematurity. Even though my amniotic sac is intact he said that bacteria can still eat through it without breaking it or causing it to leak. And I am at high risk since my uterus has been open to the world for 11 days. There are many conditions/complications that an infection could cause, the most serious being cerebral palsy and paralysis.

At this point (35 + weeks) the risks of prematurity are breathing problems, issues with regulating temperature, feeding issues and jaundice. The most serious of those problems are breathing issues. Everything else is pretty minor in comparison to the breathing, which is still less of a concern than an infection.

He proposed that we do an amniocentesis, wait for the results and if Elliott's lungs show signs of maturity we break my sac and deliver tomorrow- Dec. 16th.

So, at about 10 pm he did the amniocentesis in my room, with the help of a concurrent ultrasound. It was freaky and slightly painful but not too bad. I did not watch (I closed my eyes and covered them with my hands) because the needle is about 12 inches long.

The fluid has to be taken to a different hospital where it will be tested for lung maturity and signs of infection. These are the 4 possible scenarios tomorrow:

1) His lungs are mature and there are signs of infection. They break my water and deliver.

2) His lungs are mature and there are no signs of infection.

They break my water and deliver.

3) His lungs are immature and there are signs of infection.

They break my water and deliver.

4) His lungs are immature and there are no signs of infection.

We wait a few days and repeat the amnio.

I will be 35 weeks 2 days tomorrow. That is 4 days before when Spencer was born. I had those 2 steroid shots last week. He was taking practice breaths during the ultasound last week and tonight. I think the most likely scenario is that his lungs are mature. I was also encouraged when Dr. B said that neither of us have shown any of the early signs of an infection (me: fever and high blood pressure, Elliott: lowered heart rate, reduced movement).

So. Now we wait again. But this waiting feels different. It feels like this is my last night to be pregnant. It feels like 12/16/11 could be Elliott's birthday. It feels like tomorow will be anything but routine. It feels like I won't be able to sleep a wink tonight.

My beloved childhood basset hound, Bunny, was born on 12/16/91.

I like it.

The results won't be in until around noon, so nothing should happen in the morning. But after that.......who knows!

M, T, W & Th

2011-12-15T18:09:00.000-07:00

Monday, December 12th

This is why I should have written all this stuff sooner. All of the days are running together.

Michael took all of last week off, as we were expecting a baby to come at any minute. When it became apparent that I might be here for a while he went back to work. The first week he had been getting up early, coming and helping me to get ready (showering was tricky with the IV) and then going home in time for Spencer to get up. That makes it sound like he left Spencer alone, but my mom has been there the whole time except for 1 night my friend Monica was there and 2 nights Michael's parents were there.

So, Monday was my first solo getting ready. Since Monday this is my routine:

I am awoken by nutrition services at precisely 7 am when they knock on my door, ask if it is OK to come in as they come in without waiting for an answer and simultaneously turn on all the lights. They deliver my breakfast, turn off the lights and leave. I try to go back to sleep or do go back to sleep for an hour.

I get up at 8 and take a shower. Then I sit down and eat breakfast. Then I do my hair. Then I rest in the chair. Then I do my make-up. Then I rest in the chair. I try to minimize how much time I spend standing, so I take breaks while I get ready. Since I am dialated to 8 cm I try not to stand for too long, ever (side note: it's been over a week since I was last checked. I could be 9 or 10).

The rest of the day is spent taking and making phone calls, watching TV, visiting with the nurses (we are all becoming friends and some of my nurses visit even when I am not their patient that day), chatting with the doctor for a few minutes, having visitors, watching movies, interneting and reading. I was taking a nap every day, but I am finally getting enough sleep at night that I don't have to any more. I also have to be monitored (for contractions and Elliott's heart rate) and have vitals taken every 8 hours.

On Monday, Dr. I was on-call. We chatted and I mentioned that Dr. M had not been happy about my refusing the IV. Dr. I rolled her eyes and said that Dr. M is never happy about anything and I shouldn't worry about her. It was so unprofessional and gossipy and I just loved her for doing/saying that. It really made my day. I gossiped about it with my nurses and it made me feel almost human again.

Dr. I also wrote orders saying that I be allowed wheel chair rides but I needed to be checked for dilation before I was allowed to have one. I decided I did not want to risk anything until the results of the Group B strep test came back.

Tuesday, December 13th

Karen came to visit and brought me starbucks and home-baked treats. We had a lovely chat. The charge nurse came in to check on supplies and said she had been here the day I was admitted and that nobody could believe I was still here- undelivered. She called me a medical marvel. My preliminary results came back for the Group B strep test. They were negative. Nothing else was incredibly noteworthy.

Wednesday, December 14th

My final results came back. No Group B strep. I was so, so, so glad that they don't have to put an IV in my ankle or my scalp to start a new IV. Dr. E was on today. He came in with my chart, sat down and spent a long time with me. I mentioned that I had been looking for research on women in preterm labor that were in advanced dilation and then didn't deliver for days and days. I told him I had checked several medical journals. He told me that I could stop looking because there were no other cases. He said he had been practicing for 25 years and had never seen or heard of a case like mine. Then he said I was a medical phenomena. Then he sat in my room and read my People Magazine article about the Bachelorette. It was slightly awkward. Then he amended my wheel chair ride orders to say I didn't need to be checked, but I did need to have a nurse go with me.

The best part of the day was that an anonymous friend (he or she didn't want credit) coordinated with my first wheel chair ride so that we could take maternity pictures in the hospital "garden". I never had any tummy shots with Spencer and I'm glad that I got some this time. I hope I can share them soon.

It was literally my first time out of the room in 11 days and also my first breath of outside air in 11 days. On the way back from the garden Michael and I took a tour of the NICU. It was very sad and overwhelming and every day I have more hope that Elliott will not end up there.

Thursday, December 15th

Dr. M was back on today. She was friendlier than she had been on Sunday. I also mentioned to her that I had been trying to read anything I could on my situtation to just get more information about what to expect. She said there is no information because there is nobody else. I know everybody keeps saying this, but I have a hard time accepting that this has never happened to anybody else. I told her I would love to know what it wrong with my uterus and cervix that I can't seem to go full term when the rest of pregnancy is so easy for me. She said it might be helpful for me to think in terms of a slight irritation might have triggered labor, but my body is so incredible that it stepped in and managed to stop a labor that no other body could have stopped. She also wrote orders for me to have a consult with Dr. B, the perinatologist. I haven't seen him since the first night I was here. I just want to ask him some questions and get his opinion of some things. Once I see him I can elaborate.

Right now, 6 pm, I am waiting for Michael and Spencer. They have been visiting Santa at Bass Pro Shop. The best news is that they are bringing Ginger and I am using my wheel chair ride today to visit with her in the garden. I haven't seen her in 11 days and it is killing me.

Days 6-7

2011-12-15T15:15:00.001-07:00

I HATE that I can't load pictures into the blog right now. It's so boring to just have text. It's very stream of consciousness writing, which I am not a big fan of. I have been doing all of my facebooking on my phone and my blogging on the TV internet in my room. I hope to be setting up a laptop soon, though, so pictures may be forthcoming. It might just be pictures of my room, so don't get too excited.

I wanted to write an update on everything since my last update. Somehow, amazingly, I have been trying to write this post since Monday and have RUN OUT OF TIME on 3 separate days. How does someone on hospital bed rest run out of time?

Saturday, Dec 10th

My dad's birthday. It would have been a nice day for Elliott to join us. He did not.

I mentioned before that I have a really hard time with IV's. I am a "hard stick" and have more than one horror story with getting an IV started. I'd rather them take blood every hour than to do one IV.

I had an IV started in my left hand by the anethesiologist on Monday when I first got to triage. That one expired on Thursday so the anesthesiologist started a new one in my right hand. After Wednesday the only thing I needed the IV for was antibiotics.

We will sidetrack for a moment to talk about current childbirth practices in the U.S. because it is relevant to the rest of the story.

In a normal pregnancy the expectant mother is tested for Group B strep at around 36-37 weeks. Group B strep is a normal bacteria that grows in the digestive track of every person on the planet. It is not harmful. Sometimes, because of going potty (you know what I mean), the bacteria can be transferred to the birth canal where it can colonize. Even if that happens it is not harmful to an adult. A woman can be colonized her whole life and suffer no ill effects from it. If a baby happens to pass through a Group B strep colonized birth canal, however, it can be disastrous. If the baby gets the bacteria in their system it can cause infection, meningitis, sepsis and a host of other problems.

If a woman tests positive for Group B strep she is treated immediately so that the baby can be born safely. If she is negative she is not tested again. If she has not been tested before labor begins she is automatically treated with 2 separate infusions of antibiotics before delivery. That's what happened with Spencer. I delivered before being tested, so I was automatically treated.

Which brings us to now. Since I was 33 weeks 5 days when I came to the hospital, I had not yet been tested. Everyone assumed I would deliver that day (and within a day or two if not that day) so I was started on antibiotics immediately and was continued on them every 4 hours because I could have delivered at any minute. After I was removed from the magnesium and saline drips on Wednesday, my IV was flushed with saline, I was given a half hour penicillin drip and then it was flushed with saline again. Every 4 hours. 24 hours a day.

On Saturday evening my 48 hour old IV started leaking. The correct medical terminology is that it infiltrated, but basically the fluids were leaking into me (out of my vein) and also out of me (my hand was getting wet). My nurse tightened the IV, retaped it and hoped for the best. During my next dose I leaked all over, inside and out. It really hurt. The nurse took that IV out and said she would have to start a new one. I told her that anethesiology had been starting my IV's. She went to check with them and reported back that they told her she needed to try first. All of my nurses have been wonderful and I have really had no issues, so I would like to believe she was telling the truth.

I debated back and forth just refusing to let her even try. She was adamant though that she was just going to look for a good vein and wouldn't even try a stick if she didn't find a good vein. Thank goodness she was actually good and was able to find a vein and got it started with one, not so terrible stick. The gross part is that now my IV was in the top part of my left arm.

I had my antibiotics and then went to sleep.

Sunday, December 11th

At 4 am I was due for my next dose. She came in, flushed it and started the drip. It was immediately painful. Like really, really, really painful. I turned on the lights and saw that a huge, hard lump had started forming under my arm. And it was growing larger and more painful by the second. So I burst out in tears and pushed the call button. When my nurse came in I was crying so hard I couldn't talk. She had to guess what was wrong. By the time she saw my arm I had a baseball size, really hard bump under my skin. She immediately stopped the drip and within minutes had removed the IV.

I spent the next 4 hours alternating between crying and sleeping. I decided I was going to refuse a new IV and more antibiotics and demand I be tested for the Group B strep (which in hindsite I should have done earlier). I also made up my mind that I just would not have Elliott until I knew the results of the test (which typically takes 24 to 48 hours).

I have a different doctor from my practice each day, depending who is on call. Dr. M was here on Sunday and she was not pleased with me, but I stood my ground. If my job is to sit here and be relaxed and not go into labor then forcing an IV on me is not the way to do it. I was so stressed out about it that I would have for sure delivered if it had continued.

The other important thing about Sunday was that I was finally released from 24 hour a day monitoring and placed on every 8 hour monitoring. That has been HUGE. I can finally move around without being bothered all day and night. I even started sleeping more than 45 minutes at a time.

Stay tuned. I have a 20 minute date with the monitor and then I hope to be back with days 8 to 11. There are some humorous stories about these days, so maybe you won't be bored to tears while reading.

Some, um, revisions

2011-12-14T11:38:00.000-07:00

My wonderful friend Megan called me in the hospital after I posted my last two blog entries and said, "what the hell, no mention of me whatsoever?" Turns out being on toxic drugs and under a great deal of physical and emotional stress for 48 hours will cause a bit of memory loss. I need to clarify some events now that I am a bit more level-headed.

I had actually been trying to figure out how my mom got up here from Tucson so fast the day I came to the hospital. I remembered Michael calling her and I remembered Spencer not being at the hospital all afternoon, so I (wrongly) assumed my mom got here right away and picked him up. Turns out that is not true. Megan is the one that dropped everything and scurried over here. She took Spencer to her house to play and out to dinner and brought him back to our house and waited until my mom arrived at bed time. I had completely forgotten these events when I wrote my last post.

Megan also pointed out (in the nicest way possible) that when I was finally given permission to eat she was the one that not only got my food for me, but called Paradise Bakery and asked them to stay open so she could get my preferred sandwich and then also went to McDonald's to get me a milkshake.

Megan did not tell me that I needed to clarify these things on the blog. She was just joking with me that I could neglect mentioning such extreme helpfulness.

Yesterday Megan came over and picked up Spencer and took him to her house for the day. They played, baked cookies and made me cards/arts and crafts projects. She wrote a blog post about it.

Since I can no longer write blogs about fun days with cute pictures, you should read about it here.

I am lucky to have a friend as good as Megan that will care for my son and love him like her own. It's just one of the reasons that, whenever Elliott does finally decide to make his appearance, Megan will be his godmother. If she'll accept the offer.

I know she will do a beautiful job of helping to shape Elliott into the type of person we want him to be- caring, generous, selfless and brave.

Just like Megan.

The Last 5 Days- Part 2

2011-12-09T16:48:00.002-07:00

Tuesday Dec. 6th

So, as I said before, the magnesium had been turned down to a 2.5 because I was having so many side effects. I was still on the catheter and still being monitored constantly. It was a rough day, emotionally and physically. Everyone was prepared for me to deliver at any minute.

One of the things I have been looking forward to most for this baby is having an easier time nursing. Spencer was 4 weeks early and the early days of nursing were ROUGH. I've been thinking about how geat it will be to pick up a baby and just nurse because I have all of the knowledge about how to do it. All day Tuesday I worried about nursing. I have been told over and over that Elliott will be physically fine and I believe that, but I want to nurse and I want it to not be hard.

On Tuesday afternoon I had a great consult with the lactation consultant. I felt so much better after. She assured me that nursing is possible and we talked a lot about what to do in the first hours, days, weeks and months to make it possible. It still could be difficult, but prematurity does not make it imposible or even guarantee it will be difficult.

This whole time on Tuesday I was absolutely bed ridden. The magnesium nearly paralysed me so I literally did not sit up or get up for 48 hours.

At 3:45 on Tuesday I was given a second shot of steroids for Elliott's lungs. I was told that his chances for breathing and just general health would be vastly improved if the 2nd shot had 24 hours to take effect. That afternoon the magnesium was turned down to a 2. That made everything so much more tolerable. I no longer felt like I was dying.

Tuesday night I was also given permission to eat. I had been restricted up until this point because they didn't want a big meal in my stomach irritating my uterus. But after the 2nd shot of steroids, and with me making no more progress, the rules were relaxed. I was pretty dang hungry after 20 hours of no food.

Tuesday night I rolled over in bed around 2 am and felt a GREAT deal of pressure. I was positive Elliott was just going to fall out at any second. I had another panic attack. At about 4 am I was checked again. I was 7-8 cm dilated.

The whole time I was told by many people (doctors, nurses) that it is possible to be incredibly dilated and not deliver. They told me of a woman who has been here for 2 months dilated to 6. But nobody really believed this would happen to me.

Wednesday Dec. 7th

I had it in my mind that this would be Elliott's birthday. I was scheduled to be taken off the magnesium at 3:45. Everyone, myself included, thought my water would break and I would deliver within hours. At 3:45 they turned off the magnesium. They disconnected me from the IV and took out my catheter. By 4:30 I was in the shower (oh it was sweet!) and by 5:30 I was in bed, hair and make-up done, waiting to go into labor.

And then, nothing.

I spent the evening watching TV, having visitors, and waiting. I peed all over myself. Apparently bladder control is difficult after being on a catheter for 48 hours.

Wednesday night was nice because the doctor gave me a break from the constant monitoring. It was heaven being off the IV, off the catheter, off the magnesium and only having vitals and monitoring every 4 hours. I even slept a litle (like a 1 hour stretch and then a 2 hour stretch).

Thursday Dec. 8th

Everybody was shocked that I was still here. I was shocked. I got up, took a shower, got ready and waited. And waited and waited.

Nothing really note-worthy happened all day. At one point I sent my mom to Carter's to buy some preemie clothes, but that may have been on Wednesday. She got some really cute stuff, and at least Elliott will have some clothes that fit.

Friday Dec. 9th

That brings us up to today. People cannot believe that not only am I still here but that nothing really has happened.

I have settled into a little routine. I get up, eat, take a shower, get ready, get back into bed and wait. I took a little nap this morning. I am back on constant monitoring, which is a pain, but I am free to go to the bathroom as I need to.

I had a ultrasound this afternoon. My fluid levels are normal. Elliott is around 5 pounds 8 ounces. He was doing practice breaths, which means his lung are functioning. They couldn't see my cervix because he is so low his head is blocking it.

At this point it is all a waiting game. I am past the point of dilation that I could be sent home so I am here until I deliver. Once something/anything happens I will go fast. I only have to dilate 2 more cm and then I can push. Michael missed work all this week to be with me, but if I am still here next week he needs to go back to work. We just can't have him using all his time before we even have a baby. The concern is that if he is at home when something happens he can be here in 5 minutes. If he is at work it is 30 minutes (no traffic) to 1 hour (traffic). I am most stressed about keeping Spencer's life relatively normal. We have a plan until Sunday morning and then we'll have to just go day by day.

There are so many unknowns that we are facing now: How long will I be here? When will Elliott be born? What will Elliot's health be like? How long will he have to stay in the hospital? Every night I seem to sense that I will have him soon. During the day I feel like we could be here for a long time. It's just a big old waiting game.

I have access to the internet through my TV in my room so I will try to write more posts as things change. I can't upload pictures, but there is not much to upload anyway.

I am bored, though, so call me, email me, facebook me, text me, leave comments, come to visit me, etc.

The Last 5 Days- Part 1

2011-12-09T15:22:00.000-07:00

Those of you that I know in "real life" already know about this. Those of you that follow my blog (thank you!) but don't know me are finding out about this for the first time.

I am in the hospital. I have been here since Monday. I want to blog about this so that I don't forget the details as time goes on. This will be a loooooong post with no pictures (i.e. potentially boring) but it's as much for my own memories as anything.

Saturday Dec. 3rd

I woke up and felt like I had a touch of a cold- sore throat, congestion. Nothing too bad. I had a doctor's appointment Saturday morning. Everything was normal. We went over the signs of preterm labor. I had had none of them. I made my next appointment for Dec. 16th.

Saturday night Michael, Spencer and I went to a parade and tree lighting event. It was very cold and rainy. Spencer and I sat on the curb while we watched the parade. We took lots of pictures and I was going to do a blog post about the whole thing, but alas, the whole hospital thing happened. Later that night I got out of bed because I didn't feel good. I sat on the couch and watched some TV. I thought I felt bad because of sitting on the curb. Then I realized I had had a real contraction. I downloaded a contraction tracker app on my phone and kept track. I had 3 contractions- all 3 lasted about a minute and they were 25 minutes apart. They were tight but not painful. I drank 2 glasses of water, laid on my left side and the contractions went away. I went to bed and had no more contractions.

Sunday Dec. 4th

We stayed home all day. I felt normal all day. Megan and Scott came over and took our family Christmas picture. I ordered our Christmas cards. We made a big deal about NOT having had a baby in 2011.

Monday Dec. 5th

Spencer had a nightmare during the night so he ended up in our bed. Michael went to work and Spencer and I slept in. We got up around 9, ate breakfast, played and then went to CVS and Sprouts. We didn't have time to go home for lunch so we stopped at a deli for sandwiches. While there I had about a 10 second back spasm. It was about a 2 on the pain scale. Then I felt some pressure. That was it.

I took Spencer to school. My plan was to go Christmas and grocery shopping. Instead, out of an abundance of caution, I went to the hospital. My doctor had told me on Saturday that I could go and be hooked to the monitors whenever I needed to if I was worried. I went through triage and told them my symptoms- 3 contractions on Saturday, a 10 second back spasm and some pressure. I got some looks like I was crazy, but they put me in a gown, took a urine sample and took me into an exam area. Then they checked me. I was dilated to 5 and 80% effaced. Then things really started moving.

Anesthesiology came and got an IV started (I am very hard to start an IV on), they gave me a shot of terbutaline, started a catheter and moved me to a recovery room. I had already texted Michael to tell him to go get Spencer at school. During this time I called him sobbing. I was crying so hard I couldn't even talk. That put Michael on high alert. They showed up right as I was moved to the recovery room. Then I was checked again. And I was dilated to 6 cm. Then things really moved fast.

I was started on a huge bolus of magnesium (at a rate of 6) and then they rushed me into a labor and delivery room. I was told I would probably deliver within hours. They gave me a shot of steroids to get Elliott's lungs functioning. I knew it was serious when I had about 6 people in the room and none of them left. They just stood there. Waiting. Presumably to catch a baby.

The bolus of magnesium took about 45 minutes to go in. Then the drip was reduced to a 3. Magnesium is highly toxic and has a large number of side effects. I was immediately hot and flushed and my mind was hazy. Somehow we worked out that my mom would come immediately to take Spencer.

The next couple of hours are a blur. My mom showed up and took Spencer. Then I talked to the neonatologist. He assured me that babies at 34 weeks do quite well. The mortality rate is the same as full term babies. As long as there are no other health problems, the long term prognosis is excellent.

I stayed on the magnesium at a rate of 3 all night. I was being constantly monitored- pulse, temp, contractions, IV, breathing. I slept maybe 30 minutes. The perinatologist came to check on me around 1:30. He checked me again and I was dilated 7. I had a panic attack right then. In the morning the magnesium was turned down to a 2.5 because I was having some of the toxic side effects- blurry vision, double vision, difficulty thinking, muscle weakness. It can also cause kidney failure, but my kidneys were rock stars according to the nurses.

All this time- the first 18 hours or so- I was a MESS. Crying all the time, couldn't think, couldn't talk. Just a mess.

Part 2, and possibly 3 and more, coming soon.

Trees

2011-11-30T22:12:00.000-07:00

Waaaay back during the holiday season of 2001 Michael and I were engaged and (gasp) living together. We lived together for 4 months out of wedlock and our marriage has now lasted almost 10 years, so I think I am safe in saying that we were not "shacking up".

At that time I was working at the Senate and Michael was going to school. He also worked part-time at Michael's Arts and Crafts as a framer. The biggest benefit of that job was that he got a pretty sweet employee discount.

Using that discount we bought our first Christmas tree. A cute little 4 footer. We were so proud of it.

Our first tree last us through three apartments (in two states) and five Christmases. In 2006 we moved into our first house and my parents bought us a 7 footer.

That year, we'll refer to it as "the last year before pets or children", I decorated both trees, the seven footer and the four footer. I put all of our ornaments on the big tree and I bought a whole bunch of incredibly discounted balls to put on the little tree.

I loved having two trees. The big one was in the formal living room and the little one was in the family room. It was holiday wherever you went.

Three months later we adopted Ginger and nine months later Spencer was born. And thus, 2006 was the first and only year of having two trees. Every year we open the box containing the little tree, discover what is inside and then close it up and put it back on the shelf. Then I look longingly at the box full of balls, sigh, and say, maybe next year.

Moving on. We decorated the house for Christmas before Thanksgiving this year. Don't judge. I had helpers (my mom and dad) and I wasn't go to let them go without helping. And by helping I mean doing everything.

Last Christmas we didn't have this little table in the entry way . We got all the decorations done and then I realized I didn't have anything holidayish to put on here. I vowed I would be OK with it.

That lasted 2 days. Then Spencer and I went to Kohls with Kohls cash to spend. And we found this little tabletop 2 footer. And before I knew what happened we had bought it, put it on the table and decorated it with all the fancy balls.

I love it.

It's the first thing you see when you walk in the front door.

I want to sit on the couch and stare at it all day.

Now that I have this little guy I decided I can get rid of our 4 footer that hasn't been out of the box in 5 years. I'm bringing it to work tomorrow where our maintenance guy has assured me he will find a good home for it, either in a classroom or with a family. I feel good about it.

Additionally, I'm also looking forward to using these Target dollar section purchases.

Santa countdown #1

Santa countdown #2.

One more thing and then I'll say good night.

I saw this dress at The Limited a few weeks ago. I want it. I'd pair it with a little black shrug cardigan and wear it to a holiday party.

Alas, this is what my belly looks like and it's not meant to be.

The FEMA sponsored gingerbread house

2011-11-28T23:10:00.001-07:00

Last year we made a gingerbread train with Spencer on the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

We all had a lot of fun doing it and although we ended up tossing the whole thing into the garbage in January we still thought it would be fun to make it a tradition.

We went with the house this year.

We finished right around the time that Spencer got bored with the activity.

He asked me to take pictures of him leaving the room.

Michael and I were just starting to congratulate each other on a job well done when the roof started separating and all the candy on top fell in.

Then it really became a disaster. So disastrous that there are no pictures because I don't have that many hands.

After the roof separated, the walls caved in. So basically we had 6 pieces of fully decorated house that were dripping with thick slabs of icing, and nothing holding them together.

Spencer came back (no doubt our screams and yelps peaked his interest) and started licking the icing from all of the candy that was falling off.

We rallied all of our resources (resources being our hands, the bag of icing and a bunch of bowls) and managed to put the house back together. Then we let it sit, propped up (and with a large pot to keep the bowls from sliding), for about an hour while the icing dried.

Then we used more icing and some powdered sugar to cover the damage.

The whole experience was much more exasperating and much more hilarious than I have portrayed here.

This gingerbread house is covered in Spencer's saliva and general hand bacteria. It, like the train, will be going straight in to the trash come December 26th.

And then, an entire year will go by and we'll forget what a pain in the a** it was and we'll build another one. And Elliott will help! And hopefully not get a mouth full of icing!

Thanksgiving

2011-11-26T12:42:00.000-07:00

This year was the first year in a loooooong time that we did not have Thanksgiving dinner at my aunt and uncle's house in Casa Grande. They moved to Florida this past year, so that family tradition is over.

We started a new tradition with dinner at Lois and Jerry's house. Here is a little family lesson. My dad's brother is Terry. Terry is married to Karen. Karen's brother is Jerry. Got it? Jerry and Lois are like my aunt and uncle, only they're really not.

They have a beautiful home and backyard overlooking a golf course.

Spencer and my grandma. The day after Thanksgiving was her 94th birthday.

Michael's dad, my brother Nick and my dad

My mom and Aunt Karen

The official 2011 family photo.

Next year Elliott will have a cute outfit (I'm sure) and make it that much more difficult to get a good picture.

Spencer had goldfish for an appetizer.

My grandma got a birthday sundae.

After dinner Spencer played "garbage truck in danger". All of his vehicles always seem to find themselves falling off of cliffs.

Then we had some unexpected visitors in the backyard: a mom and baby bobcats. I know you only see 1 bobcat in each picture but I promise there were actually 2 of them.

Flashback Time

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

I am not writing this from home so I had to go through my blog archives to find and copy the previous Thanksgiving pictures. That's why they are blurry. Sorry.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. Christmas is now less that a month away.

Liars

2011-11-22T22:13:00.000-07:00

My friend Lauren posted on facebook that she had an extra ticket to a hot air balloon festival on Saturday evening. I had heard nothing about this festival so I did a little googling. What I found sounded fantastic. We (me, Michael, Spencer and my mom) decided to go. Megan decided to bring Scott and Hadley and join us. Lauren was coming with Shireen and Desmond. It was going to be such a good time.

This is the description of the event. This is cut straight from the press release:

More than 50 hot-air balloons will participate in a family-friendly balloon festival during the inaugural Arizona Balloon Classic, November 18 – 20 at Wild Horse Pass/Rawhide at the Gila River Indian Community. The weekend celebration will feature dawn patrol and morning liftoffs and landings, afternoon mass ascensions and evening glow events.

The balloons will launch and land from the grassy fields at Wild Horse Pass/Rawhide, filling the skies with massive shapes and color. Spectators will be allowed to walk on the field and watch the balloons inflate and lift off. Desert Glows, set to take place on Friday and Saturday evenings, November 18 and 19, will feature a field full of illuminated, tethered, hot-air balloons glowing and swaying to live musical performances. The weekend will also include family-friendly entertainment, skydivers, fireworks, a Family Fun Zone with children’s activities, exhibits, sampling, shopping and more.

This is what really sold it to me. The reason we decided to go:

Afternoon Fun Flights- On Friday, Saturday & Sunday at about 4:30 p.m. about 50 colorful hot-air balloons will lift-off all at the same time. It's a wonderful photo opportunity!

So, all of Maricopa County must have read this press release and agreed that it sounded like a wonderful experience, because parking was a nightmare. It took all of us between 30 minutes to an hour to just get from the freeway to a parking spot.

We managed to make it in to the festival by 4:35. I was so excited to see all 50 balloons.

And then. And then we realized that they were big fat liars.

Want to know how many hot air balloons there were? We're talking Grand Total. And not even all inflated at once.

Six.

Yep. Six balloons. That's it.

My dad is of the opinion that we should file a complaint with the attorney general's office. That seems like a lot of work, but it was definitely a rip-off.

These are the pictures I got of this oh most lame festival.

Spencer did have fun in the bounce houses. His fun was not worth the $20 Michael and I spend and the $7 my mom spent to get in.

The illuminated balloons were not impressive either. The "coordinated" glowing and swaying to music (that was NOT live) lasted about 1 minute.

There were quite a few food booths available. I just don't think there is a single fry bread or bag of kettle corn in the world that is worth a 1 hour wait.

The skydivers were fun. It was a thrill that lasted approximately 1.5 minutes.

We decided we were going to leave before the fireworks and drive somewhere close-by to watch them so we could beat the nightmare that would be traffic leaving the event. The fireworks started on the way to the car so we ended up watched them standing in the parking lot. The second they ended we threw Spencer in his car seat and got the hell out of there.

We give the balloon festival 2 thumbs down. We will not be returning next year.

Baby Shower

2011-11-20T23:27:00.000-07:00

My wonderful friend Megan had a wonderful baby shower for me and Elliott on Saturday. Megan also had a shower for me when I was pregnant with Spencer. I thought it would be fun to do a comparison of me at both showers, but then I looked at the pictures from 2007 and decided against it.

Here's the deal: I was 34 weeks pregnant at my Spencer shower. It was August. It was Phoenix. It was 110+ degrees that day. I took a shower, did my make-up, styled my hair and was dripping with sweat by the time the first person arrived. My hair was drenched and my make-up was washed away. I look awful in all of those pictures. Awful. I don't want to look at them in private, so I certainly don't want to post them online.

I will note that Spencer was born less than 2 weeks after that shower. I hope and pray that Elliott does not follow the same schedule.

Anyway. On to the fun part.

Megan was a childless newlywed when she had my first shower. Now she has a 2 year old. I wanted to help in some way since she was doing so much work. I volunteered to do dessert.

I made chocolate toffee cupcakes,

and pumpkin whoopie pies.

Megan whipped up a beautiful diaper cake.

These are some of Elliott's new clothes being used as decoration.

Sandy

Joni and Maryellen

Saying hi to Elliott

The hostess with the mostess.

My mom (Carol), aunt Karen, aunt Kathy, Lois and my mother-in-law (Jeanne)

My mom

Kathy, Brittany and Monica with Archie.

I kicked Archie out of his love nest so I could be in the picture. He was not happy.

We played games.

I sucked at multi-tasking with clothes pins.

And of course there were awesome gifts.

Joni made these!

I had just finished telling everyone about how Kathy always buys me pig presents when I opened this piggy bank from her and Brittany.

My aunt Karen and I always give each other reindeer and moose presents (it's a long family story). She did not disappoint.

Here's the co-sleeper. Pretty dang excited about this thing.

It was a wonderful party shared with wonderful people.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to Megan. I appreciate your friendship, thoughtfulness and generosity more than you'll ever know.

Oh Spencer

2011-11-16T21:03:00.001-07:00

What is up with the facial injuries? Why the face? Always the face.

Couldn't you bruise your knee? Or your arm? Or somewhere else that clothing could cover? Do you know how many black eyes this is in your short 4 years? I'm seriously asking because I have lost track.

We've taken you to the ER twice. Both times were, shockingly, facial injuries.

And while we're on the topic of all these facial injuries, why are they always before important photographs? Like your 3 year pictures, 4 generation pictures, 4 year pictures and Christmas pictures?

Why? Why? Why?

We went to the park with some friends after school today. Bethany and Trevor (siblings) are Spencer's newest, best school friends. We've been having play dates and park dates with them for about 6 weeks. Luckily their mom, Erin, and I are fast friends as well.

The kids are very independent and play on their own. Erin and I get to sit and chat and occasionally a kid will come over to tell us something before going back to play. It's lovely. When we were packing up to leave today Spencer came over with a huge bruise on his face. He told me he couldn't tell me what happened, he had to show me what happened. Then he reenacted the scene. Turns out he ran, full force, into a metal ladder when he and Trevor were chasing some girls. What's amazing is that he didn't even report this to me when it happened. It was probably a good hour before I knew he had hurt himself.

As the night progressed the bruise on his forehead turned into a bruise and huge bump on his forehead and a pretty good shiner around his eye. He hardly ever complains about anything being painful, but when we got home he said his head hurt, so I have him some Tylenol. 2 minutes later he reported it wasn't working. It also wasn't working at 4 minutes, 5 minutes, 6 minutes, 10 minutes and 11 minutes later. Then it started working. I expect it will wear off around 11 pm and we'll have a visitor later tonight.

This has nothing to do with the events of today, but this is our latest pottery creation:

I am going to have to think of something small to serve on this for Thanksgiving.

Ideas?

Veterans Day Weekend

2011-11-13T23:53:00.001-07:00

Did everybody enjoy their long holiday weekend? We had a wonderful weekend.

On Friday we took the light rail for the 1st time ever. We went to downtown Phoenix to watch the Veterans Day Parade. It took about 4 times as long to ride the light rail compared to just driving, but we were doing it more for the experience than to save time.

The parade was great. Lots of people, lots of floats and balloons.

Although I could have gone my entire life without seeing the Sun City Pom Poms.

I commend you for your athleticism late in life, but, cover up ladies. This is not a good look.

Friday night we went out to dinner and a balloon artist conned us into getting this hat for Spencer.

We started the day on Saturday by attending a sibling adjustment class for Spencer.

He learned how to hold a baby.

How to feed a baby

(side note: I was very pleased that they actually explained that moms nurse babies but they can put some milk in a bottle so that big brothers and sisters can help.)

How to burp a baby.

How to change a diaper.

And how to sing to a baby.

They also made birthday cards for their little brothers and sisters.

It was a really good class. I'm glad we went.

After the class I met my friends for lunch. Amy was hosting a ladies get-together lunch in my honor to celebrate the impending arrival of Elliott.

We met at Macaroni Grill. Unbeknownst to any of us Macaroni Grill is out of business. We formulated Plan B. We went to On the Border.

It was a lovely lunch with my wonderful friends. They were all so generous and I have some great new books to read to Elliott. I have no evidence of it though because I took 0 pictures.

Later on Saturday Spencer showed off his flexibility.

And posed with the nutcracker I bought him at Hobby Lobby after lunch. $5. They already have a lot of their Christmas stuff 50% off!

Today, Sunday, was a momentous day.

Spencer has slept in the twin bed in our room twice in the last 6-8 weeks. Once, about 2 weeks ago, when he had a bad dream at 2am and once last weekend when we made him sleep with us since Chelsea and her kids were in his room.

With the twin bed next to our bed I have to climb to the end of the bed to get up. This has not been a problem until, oh, 2 nights ago. I had to heave myself up at 1 am and it was not pleasant. Michael and I have tried switching sides of the bed but I can't sleep on his side.

So, today we took the twin bed down. It's the first time since Spencer was born that we don't have a crib, toddler bed or twin bed pushed up next to our bed.

It means that I can have my side table and lamp back.

I predict that I will actually fall out of bed tonight because I have become accustomed to having a whole extra bed next to my bed in which to spread out on. It will be nice to just roll out of bed when I have to go to the bathroom 4 times though.

Get a Melissa & Doug 25% Off Coupon When You Take the North "Poll"

2011-11-12T23:41:00.005-07:00

Chelsea emailed me last week and asked if I wanted to participate in a Melissa & Doug coupon give-away.

Heck yes!

I love Melissa & Doug.

Some of Spencer's favorite Melissa & Doug items are:

The alphabet puzzle

The "P" was lost for the longest time (like over a year) but was thankfully recovered from behind the TV.

The slicing fruit set
He's a regular Iron Chef with this thing.

The Responsibility Chart

We haven't really started using it for chores yet, but he does love all the magnets.

The animal stamps

For a while we all had animals covering our arms all the time.

Melissa & Doug want you to tell them which of their educational toys you think is the best! Just click on the image below to place your vote in the North "Poll!" You'll Get a Melissa & Doug 25% Off Coupon to use at MelissaAndDoug.com just for voting!

Christmas is coming soon.
Take the survey. Go shopping. Save money!