Life As We Knew It #nofilter

It didn't hit me how hard it was going to be having a baby in the NICU until I was discharged from the hospital, and going home without my baby. To a house where my other child wasn't going to be. (Kastyn stayed in Ephraim with Wesley's parents for a whole month! We only saw him 3 times in that whole time)For three days, although we were on different floors, all I had to do was get on the elevator and go see my baby whenever I wanted. And if I was tired or needed to get out for a minute, all I had to do was go back up to my room and sit in my bed. The day I was discharged from the hospital started out OK, until the time started ticking down and I realized that I was going to be spending the night an hour and a half away from my baby! I was going from,"She's just downstairs." to "she is in a whole other city over an hour away from me!" I don't think I talked much the whole way home. And no matter how nice it was to go home and sleep in my own bed, all I could think about was how bad I wanted to wake up and get back to my baby.

My sister lived only ten minutes away from the hospital, so we decided that Wesley would go back to work till we got her home, and I would crash on her couch and spend most of my time at the hospital. With Wesley up there with me on Wednesdays(his day off) and the weekends.

The first day went OK. I sat next to my baby in her room all day, And if I needed to get out I would walk down to the hospital cafeteria for lunch, dinner, or to refill my water jug. (The cafeteria at IMC is AMZAZBALLS by the way. We would go there to eat even if we weren't staying in the hospital). My sister worked late that night, so I hung out at the hospital till about 8:30 and decided to leave for the night. I had never been to her apartment before, so it was going to take me a bit to find it anyways. I got there, and literally started moving in to her apartment! I had enough stuff to make it through the week, including a huge blanket and pillow! So I had a lot of stuff. Plus my "hospital grade" breast pump that my insurance paid for me to rent from home health till she was two months old . You should see these suckers!! (I should have taken a picture of it before I gave it back) This thing weighed at leas 20 pounds! Then add the plastic box it comes in is another 5 pounds, with a strap to carry it by that wouldn't stay fastened for more then a minute.

OK enough complaining about how heavy the pump was!! Sorry I get off track sometimes! So I get there and set my huge pile of stuff in her living room, and take my place on the couch. We visited for a few minutes while she waited for her boyfriend to get off of work. When he got home, they decided to go out. She kept asking me if I would mind if she left, and I told her no. I really didn't mind! I didn't want her to feel like she had to entertain me, or be with me the whole time I was there. So they got ready, and they left. The second they closed the door and locked it behind them(I guess that is the kind of thing you do when you live in the city!), I just started bawling!! Not because she left me, or for any reason really! It was honestly just the first time that everything had came to a boiling point. From the minute I was told I was going to be riding on a helicopter and my baby was going to be born 8 weeks early, I never just let it all sink in. There was so much going on, and I had no clue what to expect. So there I was, completely alone for the first time in 4 days, and it all hit me! I had just spent the first day alone, 1 hour away from my husband, and 2 hours away from my little boy, and it hit me what the next few weeks of my life were going to be like.(I have never said anything, to anyone about this particular moment. Partly because I didn't want anyone feeling more sorry for me then they already did, and partly because I felt silly getting so upset, and I really had no idea why I was THAT upset! So Whitney if you are reading this, please do not feel bad! I promise its not because you left me alone in your apartment. Honestly I think I needed that five minutes alone to just break down and let it all sink in.)

I got to the NICU the next day and was told 2 things. 1-My baby had a heart murmur, and they were going to be doing an echo cardiogram to see what was causing that, and 2-There was a possibility of transporting Laynee to Utah Valley hospitals' NICU. Which would mean I could go home with my husband every night, and I would only be a half hour away from my baby. Wesley worked at Central Utah Clinic just across the street from the hospital. So I could just ride with him to work every day and he could come join us as soon as he was off work. A sense of relief came over me as I called Wesley to tell him the good news.

Her heart murmur ended up being a PDA and PDF, basically just fancy terms for saying that certain valves in her heart hadn't closed all the way yet. The murmur was gone by the time she was discharged from the hospital.

It took until the following Monday to get everything set up for the transport, and I honestly didn't know it was going to happen for sure until about 2 hours before it actually happened. They kept telling me that they were going to call and let us know when the Ambulance was on its way. So I went and grabbed some lunch, and went back to get some snuggle time with my baby until we knew what the plan was. When I got back from lunch the nurse told me that she hadn't heard anything yet, and she would let me know as soon as she did. I had been sitting in Laynee's room holding her for no more then 20 minutes when the intercom came on and said,"Life Flight is here for pod A2." A2? We were in pod A2! Was that message for me? I thought they were just taking her by ambulance and now Life Flight is here?

They pushed in a gurney with all sorts of monitors on it, and an incubator. And they had Life Flight clothes on. There was a man and a woman. The man was a respiratory therapist, and the woman was a nurse. The nurse started evaluating Laynee while the man started asking me questions.

Laynee was so upset that she was being bothered, and she had just been fed, so she was spitting up everywhere!! Like seriously EVERYWHERE!!! She stopped breathing for a minute because she had spit up so much. There was so much going on, and I was still so shocked that they sent a helicopter! I was even more confused when the man asked me if I was planning on riding with them or just following? After my own helicopter ride, I didn't think there was going to be enough room for me, And how in the heck was I supposed to FOLLOW a dang helicopter? He told me it would take about 40 minutes to get there(which is how long my own helicopter ride took from way farther away) So I finally asked them what they were driving. Turned out for whatever reason, they were wearing their Life Flight clothes in the ambulance. Confusion averted!!

I got all of our stuff together and loaded in my truck, and headed off to meet my baby at her new home away from home. I was so excited that we were going to be closer to home!

I checked into the NICU, walked through the door, my whole attitude changed and my  heart dropped! I HATED IT!! THIS PLACE WAS NOTHING LIKE IMC!!(Jen and Lisa if you are reading this please don't hate me!) For starters, she had a whole room all to herself in the other hospital.  This place was one big room filled with babies, and the only thing separating us from everyone else was a curtain. I regretted my decision immediately! I felt so selfish for moving her to this place just so I could be closer to home. They pulled me right in, introduced me to her nurse(our personalities clashed immediately!) and had me start re-labeling all of my frozen milk. I had a WHOLE KITCHEN SIZED TRASH BAG full of frozen milk! As soon as we were done with that they showed me around the floor and got me a pump so that I could pump at Laynee's bedside. I was an hour and a half past the time I needed to pump. I closed the curtain, and completely lost it!! With nurses and doctors coming in and out trying to get everything settled, and watching me uncontrollably melt down!
(Note to anyone reading this that is currently in the NICU: If you have melt downs in front of them they bring you treat buckets. The next day they felt so bad that I was so upset they brought me a whole bucket full of treats, Wesley told me I needed to keep it up if that's what we would get out of it!)

Wesley got there and it got worse! I tried so hard to stop. But no matter how hard I tried I just couldn't. And it got worse! In Murray we could have any one who wanted to visit come in as long as we didn't have more then 4 people in the room. No one younger then 14 could come in, except for siblings. So Kastyn was able to go in and see her when he was there. At Utah Valley we could choose 4 visitors, and as soon as we picked those 4 people, we couldn't change our list. And Kastyn wasn't allowed in until Mothers day, which was 3 weeks away!

As we let that sink in, the doctor came in and explained that one of the babies in Murray's NICU had a contagious bacterial infection. Laynee was going to have to be on isolation until they were sure that she didn't have it. The odds of her having it were basically zero, but they had to be safe. They had to do a "rectal swab" every night for 3 nights, and each test took 24 hours to do. She was in isolation for 5 days.

I went home telling myself that I HAD to go back with a better attitude. I kept telling myself that all sorts of babies had gone through that NICU and were totally fine. I was never actually worried that they wouldn't take care of her, Everything was just so different then what I had spent a week getting used to. And the next day was better. Every day it got a little better. She got out of isolation, we got new nurses that we LOVED, and we got used to a new way of living in this new place.

Every weekend, someone would ask me,"So when is she coming home?"
My response was always,"We don't really know, hopefully next week." Next week was always my answer. It was the worst waiting game of my life. All she had to do was eat consistently on her own and she could go home. They kept telling me that they usually pick that up between 36 and 37 weeks. But the first few times that we breast fed her she nailed it! We thought that we had this rock star baby, and that they were going to be sending her home way earlier then they expected.

 My biggest goal date to get her home was always Mother's Day. For a couple days, that goal actually seemed obtainable. Then all of the sudden she zonked out on us and was not interested in eating at all. They kept telling us that was totally normal, it was also totally annoying, and totally discouraging.

I hated breast feeding Kastyn. I had to use a nipple shield because he never latched, and it felt like a chore. I felt like all I was doing was feeding him, and I was the only one that could feed him. But with Laynee it was different. I actually really enjoyed it. I don't know if it was because at the time it felt like it was the only thing that I could do for her. Or if I just had a better attitude about it, But it was going great. Except for the days that she was so tired she didn't want to do it anymore. I felt like it was wearing her out. And it was discouraging me because I would feel like she was doing really well, only to find out that she only got 10 of her 48 ml that she was supposed to get. So a little over a week before they sent her home, we decided to switch to strictly bottle feeding, and I would continue to pump so she was still getting the breast milk.

Mother's Day came, and we were still in the hospital. The best part of my day was that they opened up the unit for "summer visitor rules" which meant that we could take Kastyn in to see her. It wasn't exactly what I had in mind when I thought about that day. I wanted my kids home. But if I couldn't have them home, this was the next best thing. Up until that day, it was the first day I had been so happy since Laynee was born.

Everyone kept telling us that one day she was just going to catch on to eating, and all of the sudden they would be telling us we would be home in 2 days. I never believed them until it actually happened. Everyday she would eat a little more then the feeding before. One day, they were still kind of questioning her, and the next day they were making arrangements for us to "room in" the next night.

When your baby is being sent home with oxygen, and a monitor, you have to stay in one of the rooms they provide for the night before you take her home. Just so that you have a nurse right down the hall if you need them. I honestly thought that was going to be a very long night. But it actually went really smooth. The monitor never went off. She only woke up twice to eat and went right back to sleep. We were discharged by 9:00 that morning and on our way home.

At the time it felt like the longest month of my life. I remember sitting there thinking so many times that we were never going to get out of there. I even said that to one of our favorite nurses and I will always remember her asking me,"Do you see any 12 year olds being gavaged?" (that what they called it when they would feed them through the feeding tube). But now that its over, it seems like it flew by. I sit here and try and remember which nurse we had what day, and I realize how fast it went. I don't miss it one bit, But I do miss some of the AWESOME people we met there. And getting to visit with them all day long. I learned things that I never would have learned if she would have been a full term baby. And although it was scary situations that brought on those learning experiences, I am so grateful for them, and grateful for the experience, Wesley and I have never been closer, and I am so much more grateful for the little moments with my kids.