The Hospital Stay

Once Hunter had arrived and the doctors had taken his vitals and made sure he was, indeed, perfect, we had some time to just hang out and recover. Hunter got his first sponge bath and he got to hang with Daddy while Mommy worked on getting my legs to move again. This took much longer than expected!

Once Hunter and I had successfully recovered we got transferred from the Labor and Delivery unit to the Mother and Infant Unit {MIU} for the remainder of our stay. I must say, our room at Pensacola hospital was much nicer and much larger. Our room here at Camp Pendleton was definitely lacking in space. We were constantly tripping over things and storing things in the bathroom - because with the pull out bed that Lane had we couldn't get in and out of the closet if we used it for storage.

Our first night on the MIU wasn't too terrible - but we did have a few bumps to overcome. We had to make sure to set alarms to feed Hunter and they came in to do vitals checks on him and on me. At one point in the evening - before I was allowed to get out of bed on my own - they took Hunter to have his vitals done. They usually did vitals in the room, but he needed to have a standard oxygen check and that can't be done in-room. Randomly they asked for Lane to meet the nurse in the nursery and so he went. He didn't come back as quickly as I would have liked and I started to get worried. Evidently Hunter had low blood sugar and a low body temp. None of this was being told to me because Lane had to stay with Hunter while the nurse ran around to get him some formula - standard procedure for the level that his blood sugar was at. There's nothing worse for a mom of a newborn to be kept out of the loop and stuck in bed without having the ability to stand up on her own! I was a wreck to say the least.

Once all the issues with that were resolved we went about our business and just kept feeding and changing diapers. Hunter was given a 24 hour deadline to pee and he didn't do so until 20 minutes before his deadline approached! Talk about on edge. I never thought I'd be so excited for him to pee in his diaper. We also needed him to pee so he could go in for his circumcision. Once he peed and they did his circumcision he was out cold because of the tylenol that they gave him. He was hard to rouse to eat, but we managed to get him up and get all of that taken care of.

At the same time as the circumcision the nurse drew his blood for a routine 24 hour check to check for bilirubin levels that correspond with jaundice and to check for other diseases of the blood. Of course when the results came back Hunter's bili levels were high and we were in for another jaundice adventure. At our next blood draw his levels were still high, but the rate of rise showed that his body was taking care and processing things alright - not great - and that the UV lights weren't necessary at that point. {We went back to the hospital for his 24 hour check from discharge and Hunter was still high risk, but not enough for the lights still. Monday we went in again and his levels were actually lower and he was in the low risk category and we don't have to go back again - unless he starts glowing or stops peeing and pooping!}

On Friday morning we were finally given the ok to head on out and call it a day! We were getting to go home! The timing was perfect. Eden was going to get a nap where she had been staying and we were able to relax for the first 30-ish minutes at home.