Friday May 8th - Katelynn came home from the hospital! Yeah! It is so fun to have a brand new baby in our home!
Monday, May 11th - We took Katie to the doctor so he could check on her jaundice. She hadn't been jaundice in the hospital, but had started to look a little bit yellow before being discharged from the hospital. Katie had her blood drawn to check the biliruben levels and we got a call directly from the doctor telling us that her levels were quite high and he'd be sending some bili-lights to our home for her to use. She would need to be under the lights as often as possible and we would need to have her blood drawn the following morning to check the bili-levels again.
Tuesday, May 12th - Blood is drawn, bili levels still too high, another night under the lights.
Wednesday, May 13th - Blood is drawn, bili levels still too high, another night under the lights.
Thursday, May 14th - Blood is drawn, bili levels are down. Katie can sleep in her own bed! Parents are thrilled! We have our sweet little baby back!
Wednesday, May 20th - Katie is 2 weeks old! We take her in to the doctor to have her PKU done. They poke her foot, but it only bleeds enough to fill half of one of the seven circles. They poke her foot again, and after about 10 minutes of squeezing her little foot and listening to her scream, the PKU sheet is done. I hate PKU sheets. The doctor comes in and says she's looking a little yellow again, so he just wants to check her bili level one more time just to be safe. WHAT! They just took a quart of blood from this girl's foot and you want to poke it again??? ARGG!
At this point, baby has had her blood drawn on 7 different days, and she's only 14 days old!!!
Later that evening, doctor calls and says her bili levels are up again...WHICH ISN'T NORMAL. He has never seen this. Put her back under the lights, but now we are going to check a little further for a more serious metabolic issue. This means more blood gets to be drawn - 4 tubes to be exact. YUCK. Mom is starting to lose it and doesn't want to watch them poke baby's foot anymore. Doctor also requests that baby is breast fed every 2-3 hours (she'd been sleeping for 6 hours at night...bye bye mom's sleep), and when done given a bottle of formula to supplement. This means feeding takes mom about 1 hour from start to finish and translates into 1 hour of sleep every other hour (bye bye mom's sanity).
Thursday, May 21st - Blood is drawn, bili levels still too high, another night under the lights.
Friday, May 22nd - Blood is drawn, bili levels are down, but doctor wants to make sure they stay down, so he puts her back under the lights for one more night and wants to see her again on Tuesday after the holiday.
Tuesday, May 25th - We take Katie back to the doctor for another check. He thinks she looks really good, the yellow is gone, but wants to check her bili level to get a base line. YES, MORE BLOOD WORK!
Now Katie's feet are starting look like she's a drug addict. All of the tests so far have come back negative (phew!) but there are still a couple more we are waiting on.
Doctor calls and says her bili level is still down (sigh) so we can finally send the lights back.
Through all of this, Sammy has become quite the protective older brother. Each time he'd see her under the lights, he'd walk over and say "Hi baby." The last time I took her to the doctor, Sammy screamed and flailed and grabbed at Katie whenever the doctor came in.
Today, May 28th - Baby is doing great, although I can't tell if she's looking yellow or not. Hopefully its just the lights in my house! I hope and pray that the jaundice doesn't come back and that she can just be a "normal" baby.
13 comments:
Michelle-Sounds very stressful. I will pray that she is all better. I can relate to the ridiculous sleep. With twins, feeding was SO time consuming for the first few months. As soon as We'd finish up with both of them, I'd have maybe an hour to sleep and it would start all over again. On a lighter note, she is adorable as is Sammy.
good old bili lights. we had to do that for 3 days with zoe, too. i feel for you in not wanting to see any more pokes...hated that part (and the numerous trips to the lab day after day). glad to hear she's doing better, and hope you can get some sleep. she's so darling!
What a cute little family!!! Thanks for the update I have been meaning to ask.
Oh, guys! No fun! I swear, everyone I know has been in and out of the doctor's office/hospital this week! Time for everything to calm down, I say! We'll be praying for all of you! For lots of sleep and low bili levels and no more pokes and all of that! Love you!
Yikes, that's no fun to see your baby poked and poked. Hope that she's done with it for good! (And that last picture is pretty adorable.)
thats no fun, I cried when Jefferson had to stay under the lights for a few nights, we will pray for you guys!
Hope it's ok that I blog stalked you today! She is beautiful.
Wooo. Just reading that makes me exhausted for you guys. That makes for a busy month of little sleep. Hope her color stays good and the routine gets better!
Oh poor little baby!!! (and poor mom too!) I hope she keeps doing well--and no more blood work for a while!!!
Hey its wendy's sister in law. I'm a "blog stalker" also today. Sorry to hear about all that our little lexi was stuck at the hospital under the dumb lights and they poked her like crazy it about killed me. Glade to know its all over for you and that sammy loves his little sister so much, good man.
Hi Guys! Congratulations on the new baby girl. She is beautiful!! We are so happy for your family. I hope all is going well.
We will have to get together so we can meet the new little one! -Natalie
I hope no more of that either. I HATE when they have to poke them but so many times, I am so sorry. Thankfully she won't remember any of this. She is darling. I love the new family photo.
I can't remember if I ever said congratulations! If not--here it is! It is so fun that our kids are the same ages and gender. I went back and read your older blog posts to get the whole story and it was so neat to hear about your own little miracle of life! You are awesome and you have a beautiful family!
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