Isaiah, the day you were born was easily the happiest day of my life. It was not only MY birthday but you wer born only 18 minutes later than the exact time I was born. You were the best present any mommy could ask for. I went in to be induced on Wednesday August 8, 2012. Your daddy and I could barely sleep the night before. We were so excited to meet you! We had all out bags packed, our birth plan printed out, newborn pics were scheduled, and we were ready! We arrived at the hospital at 7:30 am. Mommy cried in the car on the way there because she was so scared and nervous and excited all in one. I couldn't believe it was really time to have you! The day progressed slowly. They gave me pitocin to help induce the labor. Hour after hour, contraction after contraction, mommy was not changing very quickly. Grandma, Grandpa, Aunt Casey and Daddy all spent the night together waiting for your arrival but the labor went into the next day (OUR birthday!) The nurses and the doctor woke me up by coming in and singing Happy Birthday to me! They said it may be my last birthday! I have a feeling they are right! Eventually, after using a balloon, an unsuccessful epidural, and 28 long hours of labor it was time to PUSH! Yay!!! I was exhausted, and hadn't eaten anything but ice chips but I was determined not to have you by c-section. The clock was ticking since my water had been broken and I knew I had to get you outta there! After a very short time of pushing, the doctor came in and Grandma and the doctor got cleaned and scrubbed up. Daddy and Aunt Casey were there helping mommy stay focused. After 2 big pushes your made your debut! But the cord was wrapped around your neck so the doctor went ahead and cut the cord. Then Grandma took over! She helped deliver you the rest of the way! You came into the world a little blue but strong! They placed you on my chest for a short time before taking you away to help you start to cry. It was the longest 45 seconds of my life. I just needed to hear you cry! Finally I heard it! You screamed out and it was the most beautiful sound I'd ever heard. I started to cry too! Your first breath took ours away! Daddy cut your cord and kept a close eye on you until they could bring you back to Mommy. You were an instant expert at breastfeeding and the rest of the day was a dream. SO many people who loved you came to share in our joy. I was exhausted but didn't want it any other way. To watch all the people I love hold my child and love on him made me the happiest Mommy in the world. Your Daddy instantly fell in love with your pretty blue eyes (we hope you keep them!) and eventually as the people started to fade away. I held you close in my arms and watched you sleep. I couldn't take my eyes off of you. It was time to go to sleep for our first night together as a family. I put you in the bassinet next to my bed, made sure I had everything within reach and together we drifted off to sleep. I was the happiest Mom in the world! As I closed my eyes thanking God for you, I had no idea what the next few hours would hold. As any new mother knows. There is no real sleep when you have a baby, ecspecially the first night. Any peep a baby makes wakes you up! Thank God! I heard you spitting up and Grandma and I popped up at the same time and looked at you. You were spitting up a clear fluid and so I instantly started looking for the bulb syringe that we had the day before. It was NO WHERE to be found! So I had to call the nurse and haver her bring us a new one. I thank God for the nurse or person who took the bulb syringe out of my room the night before. It helped save my babies life. A nurse named Shannon came in with the syringe and got the fluid out of your mouth and explained to me that sometimes babies can have amniotic fluid in their lungs and it was normal. The next question she asked me would forever change our lives Isaiah, yours especially! All throughout my pregnancy and especially towards the end people kept telling me to let my baby stay in the nursery while in the hospital. I like to think it was God softening me and preparing me for this moment. It was people I looked up to as good parents that had told me to let you stay in the nursery. I kept telling myself there was no way I would EVER let my baby go to the nursery. I felt it would make me a bad parent! Then Shannon asked me "Would you like me to take him to the nursery for you so you can get some rest? We will bring him in to you whenever he wakes up to eat." For some reason everything inside me was saying "Give this lady your baby" With great hesitation and feeling of some guilt. I said "ok" As she left the room I looked at your Grandma and said "What? It doesn't make me a bad mom!" As Grandma laughed at me she said sweetly "No sweetheart it doesn't" About 20 min later Shannon and Dr. Villaveces came into the room. In soft voices they explained to me that only minutes after you had arrived in the nursery you turned blue and stopped breathing. It took over 2 minutes for them to revive you. They said you never made a noise only turned blue and stopped breathing. Had you been in mommy's room that night, in the dark, I would have never known you turned blue and you would have passed away. The thought of how close your father and I were to losing you sends chills down my back and brings me to my knees. You were spared and saved by the grace of God and for that I am eternally grateful. Within the time that the doctor and Shannon were talking to us, you had another episode! That was two in less than 30 minutes. Each lasting for well over 2 minutes. The miraculous thing is, Isaiah, that the nurse the was assigned to mommy that night was normally a NICU nurse. She just happened to pick up an extra shift on the maternity floor to help out a friend. So she knew exactly what to do when you turned blue, and when I asked her if she suspected that anything was wrong when she came in and saw you spitting up and she said "no not at all, I just always offer to take the baby so the mother can rest." You see, son, God placed that nurse there at the right place and right time, to protect you. Another amazing God-send was the NICU doctor that was on that night. Her name was Carmen Villaveces and she was from Cuba so she spoke PERFECT spanish! This was a blessing in itself, because she was able to really explain everything to Daddy and he felt comfortable asking her questions. After about an hour they allowed us to go back into the NICU, they made an exception this one time and allowed both your father and I, and Grandma back into the unit. Normally it is only two at time (and at least one has to be the parent). We went back and you were located in the far back corner. When I saw you for the first time with all the tubes and machines hooked up to you I got tears in my eyes. You were so small and so alone. I just wanted to scoop you up in my arms and never let you go. I couldn't touch you though. You were on oxygen, a feeding tube and IV had been started. You were on so many monitors that there was no way you could even move. As the three of us stoof there listening to them explain all your "equipment" a nurse came over and started messing with one of the monitors. I remember her walking around us a few times and then suddenly hearing her say " he's going again" and I looked down at you, my baby boy, and you were blue..and stiff...and lifeless...
Shannon pulled me back and the doctor and other nurses rushed over. They started rubbing you and trying to stimulate you to breathe, and pump more oxygen into you. As tears rolled down my cheeks, I stood in a bit of shock. Shannon asked if I wanted to leave, and I replied "Im not leaving him" After a few seconds, which felt like hours, the doctor pulled out a large metal pole and began to shove it down your throat to help you breathe. You remained blue and stiff. The doctor turned around sharply and said to Shannon, "You need to get her out of her now!!" Grandma and Daddy and Shannon turned me around and started to guide me out of the NICU. Before I could make it out, I lost it. I thought I had just watched my son die before my very eyes. I wailed and screamed out and wept for you. All I remember was collapsing in my mother's arms and feeling a pain in my heart I cannot describe. I truly thought I had lost you. Tears roll down my face as I write this, just remembering that moment is too much to bear. I will never forget that moment.
We finally got to the room and after some time Dr. Villaveces came in and said that you had had another episode. That made about 5 in 2 hours. They had tried to intubate you so that you could be put on a respirator, but you fought them so hard that they were unable to get it in. They had called up a special team that came in and after 3 more tries they were able to get you on the respirator. I was a little more relieved at that point because I knew now if you stopped breathing again, that the machine would breathe for you. They said that they were taking you down to get a CAT scan because they could not find any problems with your heart or lungs that would explain the episodes you were having. They told us that if the CAT scan came back normal that you would be airlifted to Levine's Childrens Hospital and more tests would be run. The CAT scan came back showing that you had suffered a subarachnoid hemorrhage and were bleeding out in your brain. It also showed that you had a temporal contusion on the left side, exactly where the hemorrhage had occurred. Either one of those on their own may not have caused serious problems for you, however the very rare combination of both of them in their exact location caused pressure on the brain, resulting in seizures that caused you to stop breathing. They determined later that you were not continually bleeding and said they didn't know what effects, long term or short, that this would have on you. Only time would tell. We had to wait for you to start absorbing the blood and hope that the length of time without oxygen and the numerous seizures had not caused any brain dammage or physical disabilities. Isaiah, I can't really put into words what I was feeling at the time. I hadn't slept in days, I had just labored for 28 hours and given birth, and mentally now I was crumbling. I just cried and cried and cried and there was no sleeping, or eating. My body yearned for you, it litterally ached to be near you and I couldn't be with you. Because of your condition, we were not allowed access to you but for certain times of the day and they were limited to about 30 minutes. We weren't allowed to touch you or stimulate you in any way. I hope you never have to know the pain of having a child and having them hurt, and not being able to hold them or touch them or even be near them. I would go and sit in your room quietly and just look at you for as long as they would let me. And when my time came again to be allowed to see you again, I was back again.
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| First time Mommy got to hold you! |
Grandpa and Aunt Casey and Uncle Chris came to see you. It is, I'm sure, a sight they will never forget either. Great Grandpa and Grandma came to visit you everyday. A lot of times they were not even allowed to see you, but they sat patiently with mommy and daddy and supported us. Friday was a LONG day. It is then that we asked all of our friends and family to pray and pray hard. We needed a miracle. We needed God to save our son. Early Saturday morning your father and I woke up to go and see you for one of our visits and the nurse told us that you had excabated yourself off the respirator! Now, this doesn't sound as amazing as it is, until I tell you that you did it with no hands! That's right! You took out the respirtator tube (that was all the way in your lungs) by yourself with no hands! You had your hands restrained by the IV and were not able to really move, you used your muscles internally to take out the tube. It goes without saying that for a newborn, this is next to impossible. God decided you didn't need that respirator anymore. At this point you had developed jaundice and were still on a feeding tube and IV. But the respirator was gone. We continued just sitting quietly with you and waiting for answers. You were given an EEG and it showed that you were continually having numerous little seizures all the time. In addition to the morphine that you were on, they started you on Phenobarbitol (an anti convulsant) to help control the seizures. I was discharged from the hospital on Saturday but they allowed me to stay as a "guest" in a room with daddy so we could be near you. They set me up with a breast pump and told me to pump like it was my job! And pump I did son! I was a pumping machine. Whenever I wasn't with you, I was pumping. I didn't have much to give you. With the colostrum I could only get about 1-2 ml for you. I would walk into the NICU with pride as I handed them the syringe of food and watched them pump it directly into your stomach through the feeding tube. The nurse told me that one small drop of my colostrum or milk was more helpful to you than 10 IV bags of fluids and nutrients that they could give you. She aslo told me that you could tell when I was around. Whenever I would walk into the NICU my body would start to feel funny, my stomach would contract, my heart would beat faster. I could feel you in my soul. I was told my milk would likely not come in on time because of the stress that I was under, but I didn't give up. I continued to pump.
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| Finally out of my incubator! This is Shannon the nurse who helped save my life! |
Sunday morning your father and I went in for our usual morning visit and they informed us that today you had decided to take out your own IV! They said your vein blew and they tried several times to start a new one, and even had an IV team come and try and they had no success. The doctor decided that if you were going to take yourself off the respirator and your IV that you were deciding for yourself that you were done with those things and ready to be on your own. She said it was truly mind boggling at the way you were doing these things. She said she had not even wanted to attempt taking you off the respirator or the IV for another 3 or 4 days! But you, my sweet Isaiah, had had enough! So, the doctor ordered that if you were going to be off the IV you had to eat, and EAT you did! The first time they gave you a bottle they wanted you to at least get 30 ml and you drank and drank until the nurse took your bottle away! I think you would have taken the whole thing if they'd let you! Unfortunately, when you ate, you would forget to breath again. Your face would turn a gray color and they would have to rip the bottle out of your mouth and remind you to breath again.
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| This was your progress airplane. When everything was green you would be able to come home. |
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| Finally no more reds! We just needed some greens! |
In order to make sure that it was you not having seizures anymore and not the medicine, they started to ween you off the seizure medication and if you could make it until Saturday without another episode, or stopping breathing while you ate, they would let you room in with me on Saturday and come home on Sunday! I was so excited to finally know that you were getting better!
Each day we did the same routine, your daddy and I would come in to feed you, and then I would pump and then we'd do it all over again. All night long through and all day, we lived for our times of 8-11-2-5. Those were the times we came to feed you. We were always early and stayed as long as we could. We would read you stories and softly sing you songs.
The physical therapist came in on Friday to evaluate you and labeled you with having "poor/low muscle tone" She gave us lots of exercises to do with you and taught us how to do baby massage! We have been doing them EVERYDAY and you have already made great progress. |
| Saying goodbye to Shannon..we will never forget you! |
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| Looking good! |
So much so that your pediatrician is not worried that you won't catch up by you 4 month Physical therapy evaluation. Saturday morning I was just getting ready to get up and head to the NICU when there was a knock at my door, it was you!! The nurse brought you in to room with us for the day! We were so scared to go to sleep that night for fear of the same thing happeneing again but you made it through the night and the next night and the next. We brought you home on Sunday August 19, 2012.
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| Home Sweet Home |
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| So happy to be home! |
A wonderful man named Timmy, whom you will come to know very well one day, told your father and I something one day that has made all the difference. He told us that Isaiah was a very strong name and that some of the greatest men in the Bible had VERY rough starts into this world. Like Moses and even Jesus himself. SO we consider it a great blessing and honor that God would work in our lives and bless us with such a special child. We KNOW you will do great things in life and that your life was saved for a reason. And while we still pray for your continued recovery and that there will be no long term effects we praise God each day for the progress you've made and continue to make each day. We are continuing to grow and know God in a new way everyday because of your life and it has changed the way we look at life, the way we look at God and the way we look at you. Without this incident all of our lives would be different. We dedicate our lives and yours to his Glory and his will. I can't wait to see what this life has in store for you son. You are truly special and great things are sure to come to you. We love you more than words can say. We are so proud of the fight that you have inside. We are so blessed to hold you and kiss you and call you our son. Te amo mi hijo.
"Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done and proclaim that his name is exalted. Sing to the Lord for he has done glorious things; let this be known to all the world." -Isaiah 12:4-5
