After some time, B ran to P. Terrys and got me a DOUBLE CHEESEBURGER AND FRIES. I didn't even hesitate to ask for the double. I don't usually order a double but Momma needed it after so long without anything to eat. He got back and the nursery was there to start taking all his stats. They went to take his blood sugar levels since I had high blood pressure the last stint of my pregnancy. First reading....zero. Um ok? Second reading... 12. On top of super low blood sugars, he was breathing too fast. They called down to NICU and asked what they would like to do. They wanted him down there immediately. He headed to the NICU, and Brian followed. I stayed back because I was getting moved to post partum. In my naive mind, I thought "Oh Luke will stay a night in NICU and then he'll be done there. Or maybe not even a night." Wrong. So very wrong.
I got moved over to post partum and immediately told my nurse that I wanted to go down there. She pushed me down in my wheelchair. I remember rounding the corner and seeing isolette after isolette of all these tiny babies. I was shocked. I had huge tears in my eyes. WHAT? Why was I here? Why are there so many babies here? They shouldn't be here either. We got to Luke's room and respiratory was there along with his nurse. He was SCREAMING and I lost it. He had an IV and all these wires attached to him. It wasn't fair. B was as usual calm cool and collected. He was very happy with Luke's nurse and knew everything that was going on.
Luke was started on a glucose drip to bring his sugars up. They told us..."Oh maybe 2 days and then he can go." That wasn't the case. He had to get his sugars up, eat well, and then tolerate weaning off the drip. It took him about 3.5 days to get off the drip and maintain. He was eating GREAT. And then guess what? JAUNDICE reared its ugly head with a vengeance. The whites of his little eyes turned yellow which is the last bit to turn and is bad. He was on photo-therapy for about a day. After he was turned off the BILI light, he then had to maintain those levels. But he did it. He was released on a Wednesday night to come home with us. We were ecstatic and at the same time nervous.
We had amazing nurses. They loved him and loved us so well. I remember we were walking down the LONG hallway with our Luke and all the nurses at the stations lit up because they knew he was finally going home. I had a huge lump in my throat. I wanted to take them all home with me. They always answered our many calls, our questions, gave us guidance, and assured us he was doing great during his stay.
Five days in the NICU. For us, it was FOREVER. For others, that's a walk in the park. All the mommas and daddies we saw who have their babies there for months....I cannot even begin to imagine; some even had their weights posted on their little incubators....1 pound... oh my word. What is crazy to me is that I have TWO friends who both had their babies born VERY early. One in the same hospital as us, and just a day before Luke arrived. They are still there getting him better and ready to go home. I don't wish the NICU on any parent. It's stressful and not where you want to be. But the people that work there are like no other. They are educators, friends, cheerleaders, and become your closest confidant. I am thankful for the many nurses we met and the neo-natologists who were AWESOME.
We kept our pictures of Luke in the NICU to ourselves. I will leave you with one as it was a private experience for our family and don't want to put Luke out there in his vulnerable state. Besides, nobody wants to see a sweet baby with all kinds of leads coming off of them. I know it makes me so sad.
