NICU Day 69 ~ (February 14th)

Well, our Valentine's Day ended up being pretty rough, to say the least.  It started out well with no changes being made to Noelle's care, and she had a good morning although her acid reflux was still bothering her quite a bit.  Still, I was able to hold her for a short while and spend some sweet time with her.  However, everything changed this afternoon after her eye exam.  I had left the hospital for a few hours to get some things done and received a phone call from the NICU.  My heart always skips a beat when I see that number, but they informed me that she was okay but that they wanted my consent to transfer her to Baptist for laser eye surgery.  The vessels in her eyes are growing too quickly and need to be dealt with as soon as possible.  Tom and I gave our consent and rushed to the hospital in time to meet the transport team and say goodbye to our Forsyth NICU family.  They have assured us that we will be allowed to return once she has been cleared after the surgery, but we're still looking at a week or two being away from our "home."  I knew I would have mixed emotions the day that Noelle moved to NIC 2, so being transferred completely out of the hospital in which we have lived the past 9+ weeks was/is extremely disconcerting.  We had lots of hugs "goodbye" with promises that we would see everyone again soon, and we're praying that that will indeed be the case.

 ~Exhausted Sweet Baby Girl~

Noelle seemed to handle the transport fairly well, but by the time she was starting to get settled into her new place, I could tell she was getting very tired.  She had been awake for quite some time, and since she was being admitted into another hospital, she was constantly being touched, poked, and prodded.  She had to have yet another eye exam, and shortly after that is when she decided she had had enough.  She clamped down, quit breathing, and as Tom half jokingly put it tonight, "she proceeded to take another 10 years off our lives!!"  She has done this once before, but today the episode lasted longer, and they had to do some chest compressions and bag her for about 30-45 seconds.  They almost intubated her again, but thankfully she recovered and started breathing on her own.  The evening still has been up and down as she has had one "brady" (dropping of her rate) after another.  She is absolutely exhausted, and it is obvious that she knows she is not in familiar surroundings.  I never thought I would be wanting to hear the alarm sounds from our old NICU, but after the new monitor sounds all evening, I found myself just wanting to hear the normal alarms to which I am accustomed.  I know what every one of those sounds mean, but here, everything is different.

 

 ~Holding Mommy's Hand & Trying to Get Comfortable~

She finally seemed to settle down late tonight, and we are praying she gets some good rest and can adjust well to her new environment.  She will have to have another eye exam tomorrow, and from there surgery will be determined.  I know it is probably harder on us than it is her, but she is definitely aware on some level that these are not her regular nurses, and this is not her normal space.  It was incredibly hard to leave her tonight.  At "home," all of her nurses know her, her likes and dislikes, her history, her tendencies, and they really do love her and care for her incredibly well.  The nurses here are good as well, but the atmosphere here is completely different than what we had before.  Honestly, I dislike it all very very much, and God is teaching me patience and a new level of contentment like never before.

 ~Noelle's New Corner~

There are still blessings through this.  Her doctors are exactly the same, since all of her neonatologists at Forsyth are actually from Baptist.  It is also a huge blessing that she is here for something more "minor."  Twice, they have had her papers ready to transfer her when they thought she was developing NEC and another time during all the issues with her heart.  Thankfully, this issue is not as serious in many respects.  Still, it's scary and disconcerting, and we're praying that she can do well through this and be back "home" at Forsyth very soon.  We are now readjusting our schedules and plans again so that we can be available to her as much as possible through all of the transitions and procedures. We should learn more tomorrow about what is exactly happening with her eyes and what the ramifications are for her, and we will definitely continue to keep everyone posted.  Thank you so very much for praying for us.  I know that you have not stopped even through the good days, and that is an incredible encouragement to us as we hit the "rougher" days.  God continues to make Himself real to us and show us that He is in control, not us, and we know He will continue to see us through.