Well the baby isn't really shrinking but he isn't gaining any weight which is just as scary to me. I have never encountered this problem with my other children so it is alarming. I am feeding him every 2-3 hours and he doesn't act like he's still hungry so I am confused about his lack of weight gain. Well very little weight gain anyway he was 8.1lbs when he was born, he was 7.6lbs when we went home 4 days later and at 2 weeks he was 7.5lbs! Yesterday when we had him weighed again he was up to 7.7lbs so that is an improvement but the question is if he can keep it on...We'll keep trying and hopefully he'll start catching up and get hefty soon.
I am surprised at how different things are this time around, having two older children does make things a little easier. The kids are very helpful so far, we just have to figure out how to keep the 10 year old off the baby, she wants to hold him all the time and you can't convince her that he isn't a doll!
Friday, January 8, 2010
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Baby Josiah
I haven't wrote a blog in so long I have enough to write 4 or 5 blogs! Well the biggest thing that has happened since I last posted is Josiah's birth. On December 19th after much anxiety and anticipation Josiah Charles Reeves joined our family by way of emergency c-section. I'll start with the night he was born and work from there so it makes sense...
Friday,December 18th I got ready for work at the hospital, expecting my shift to be one of my last before the baby arrived, but not realizing it would be the last. I was scheduled to work a 7pm-7am shift and it started out like any other Friday night at work. I had 5 patients and after introducing myself to all of them I got my medications ready for my 9pm med pass and got to work...I had a busy set of patients and one new admission so I was pretty busy. Around 9pm I went to the nurses station to sit down and chart a little bit, and look at orders when I noticed some low back pain and nausea that had been plaguing me all day. I mentioned it to my charge nurse and all the nurses on the floor decided that I needed to go to OB and get checked to be sure I wasn't in labor. I didn't feel like I was in labor and insisted that it was nothing. My charge nurse pulled rank and called our supervisor who also insisted I go get checked. So feeling like an idiot and not expecting anything at all to be going on I clocked out and went to OB where my whole night took an unexpected turn...
I let the nurses know what was going on and that I expected nothing out of the ordinary to be going on. I was working and it is a hard job and I was just more tired being 38 weeks pregnant than I normally am. So they took my clothes and gave me a gown and hooked me up to the monitors. Well at first I didn't notice anything abnormal but then they kept checking the monitors and eventually they brought in an ultra sound machine and while they were looking at the baby I noticed for the first time that something wasn't right with his heart. It was beating really fast and then one of the nurses explained that the baby was in SVT-now I am not a cardiac nurse but I know that isn't a good thing, it means that his heart was beating too fast. Josiah's heart rate had been running around 140 at all of my OB appointments and now was up to 240, this is not good for an unborn baby. So they called the on call doc and I called my husband to tell him he should probably come to the hospital now. All the while I am trying to remain calm so he doesn't realize how scared I am...so from there I got a catheter, and IV and very nearly broken heart as I waited to find out what would happen next.
Well being a nurse and knowing that the baby's heart was involved I automatically assumed they would want to do a c-section so that he wasn't under any further stress. I didn't realize yet that I would have to go to another hospital to do this but it would of course make sense to be at a hospital with a NICU as opposed to flying the baby after he was born...so the nurse gave me a heads up and I let the doc know that if I was leaving I wanted to go to St. Louis so the baby could go to Children's Hospital. Well they were busy with their own emergency and couldn't talk to my doctor so my next option was Columbia, where my friend Candice had just had her baby 5 days before. So since it was snowing and they could not fly us in the helicopter (thank you God) we got to ride to Columbia in an ambulance on a hard as rock stretcher with the lights and sirens blaring! What a ride, all the way to Columbia with no monitors at all on the baby!! let's just say God and I had a nice long chat on the way, and I made it without the panic attack that never felt farther than a breathe away taking over.
I arrived shortly before my husband, mother and best friend that drove like maniacs after us. Four doctors introduced themselves and accompanied by their own ultrasound machine began to exam my, still in distress, unborn baby. I would just like to say that I have never been so scared in my life, and must have offered myself in his place a thousands times in those few short hours. God being the gracious God that He is spared us both and after an unexpected surgery and enough panic for a lifetime my third child was born and whisked away to the NICU before I ever got more than a glimpse of him.
Nine very long and drugged hours later I finally got to meet the little guy that couldn't make an ordinary entrance. The doctors were pleased with his health and were unable to detect any defect in his heart. So weighing in at 8 pounds 1 oz and 21 inches long, Josiah Charles Reeves was born at 0301 in Columbia Regional Hospital.
I had never had surgery before and this being unexpected I wasn't quite prepared for the next few days and all the discomfort that accompanies a c-section. I made it though and I have a new respect for my patients! After 4 days in the hospital and learning that Percocet is my friend I got to go home with our new baby!
It has been pins and needles really, I am constantly checking to see if he is breathing and I am scared to let him sleep on his own, so 17 days in he is still sleeping on my chest because I am afraid to let him go. I know this is irrational but for today I am going to be irrational and keep him close enough to feel every breathe he takes.
Friday,December 18th I got ready for work at the hospital, expecting my shift to be one of my last before the baby arrived, but not realizing it would be the last. I was scheduled to work a 7pm-7am shift and it started out like any other Friday night at work. I had 5 patients and after introducing myself to all of them I got my medications ready for my 9pm med pass and got to work...I had a busy set of patients and one new admission so I was pretty busy. Around 9pm I went to the nurses station to sit down and chart a little bit, and look at orders when I noticed some low back pain and nausea that had been plaguing me all day. I mentioned it to my charge nurse and all the nurses on the floor decided that I needed to go to OB and get checked to be sure I wasn't in labor. I didn't feel like I was in labor and insisted that it was nothing. My charge nurse pulled rank and called our supervisor who also insisted I go get checked. So feeling like an idiot and not expecting anything at all to be going on I clocked out and went to OB where my whole night took an unexpected turn...
I let the nurses know what was going on and that I expected nothing out of the ordinary to be going on. I was working and it is a hard job and I was just more tired being 38 weeks pregnant than I normally am. So they took my clothes and gave me a gown and hooked me up to the monitors. Well at first I didn't notice anything abnormal but then they kept checking the monitors and eventually they brought in an ultra sound machine and while they were looking at the baby I noticed for the first time that something wasn't right with his heart. It was beating really fast and then one of the nurses explained that the baby was in SVT-now I am not a cardiac nurse but I know that isn't a good thing, it means that his heart was beating too fast. Josiah's heart rate had been running around 140 at all of my OB appointments and now was up to 240, this is not good for an unborn baby. So they called the on call doc and I called my husband to tell him he should probably come to the hospital now. All the while I am trying to remain calm so he doesn't realize how scared I am...so from there I got a catheter, and IV and very nearly broken heart as I waited to find out what would happen next.
Well being a nurse and knowing that the baby's heart was involved I automatically assumed they would want to do a c-section so that he wasn't under any further stress. I didn't realize yet that I would have to go to another hospital to do this but it would of course make sense to be at a hospital with a NICU as opposed to flying the baby after he was born...so the nurse gave me a heads up and I let the doc know that if I was leaving I wanted to go to St. Louis so the baby could go to Children's Hospital. Well they were busy with their own emergency and couldn't talk to my doctor so my next option was Columbia, where my friend Candice had just had her baby 5 days before. So since it was snowing and they could not fly us in the helicopter (thank you God) we got to ride to Columbia in an ambulance on a hard as rock stretcher with the lights and sirens blaring! What a ride, all the way to Columbia with no monitors at all on the baby!! let's just say God and I had a nice long chat on the way, and I made it without the panic attack that never felt farther than a breathe away taking over.
I arrived shortly before my husband, mother and best friend that drove like maniacs after us. Four doctors introduced themselves and accompanied by their own ultrasound machine began to exam my, still in distress, unborn baby. I would just like to say that I have never been so scared in my life, and must have offered myself in his place a thousands times in those few short hours. God being the gracious God that He is spared us both and after an unexpected surgery and enough panic for a lifetime my third child was born and whisked away to the NICU before I ever got more than a glimpse of him.
Nine very long and drugged hours later I finally got to meet the little guy that couldn't make an ordinary entrance. The doctors were pleased with his health and were unable to detect any defect in his heart. So weighing in at 8 pounds 1 oz and 21 inches long, Josiah Charles Reeves was born at 0301 in Columbia Regional Hospital.
I had never had surgery before and this being unexpected I wasn't quite prepared for the next few days and all the discomfort that accompanies a c-section. I made it though and I have a new respect for my patients! After 4 days in the hospital and learning that Percocet is my friend I got to go home with our new baby!
It has been pins and needles really, I am constantly checking to see if he is breathing and I am scared to let him sleep on his own, so 17 days in he is still sleeping on my chest because I am afraid to let him go. I know this is irrational but for today I am going to be irrational and keep him close enough to feel every breathe he takes.
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