Long Entry.. the arrival of my son

As you can probably tell from my last post, yes, I am now a father.

We knew the baby was going to be early. My wife has high blood pressure, which the pregnancy was making worse. This is not good for a baby because it can restrict bloodflow, which can limit the amount of oxygen the baby is getting. The doctors were all very sure that they would be inducing labor early, and they were performing weekly tests which included ultrasounds and heart monitoring to make sure the baby was ok. During one of these tests, we were able to find out that we were having a boy, and we picked the named Conner James. The James is after my wife's grandfather.

My wife was ordered to stay out of work after a late night hospital visit. Her blood pressure was acting up and was causing problems. She had a lot of vacation and sick time saved up, so this was no problem for us. I figured we would have a few more weeks to get ready for the baby and she could get the rest she needed.

Fast forward to the following week. It is Tuesday, shortly after 10am. I am lying in bed, peacefully sleeping and I am slightly woken up by the sound of the phone. I choose to ignore it. The answering machine picks up after 4 rings. The phone rings again. This is a sign that my wife is trying to get ahold of me, so I slowly walk(crawl) to the phone to answer it. I am not a pleasant person when I wake up.

My wife informs me that the doctors want to induce.. today!

My first thought: OH SHIT!

So I call a few necessary people, shower, all that kind of stuff. We pack some things and head to the hospital. We stopped at the store to grab some things(magazines, munchies for me), and then check in.

The room itself was big. They had this thing for the baby to sleep in, since everything would be done in the room. Delivery, recovery, baby, etc. The nurse told us to move in, since this could take awhile. Honestly, I figured the baby would be there that night or early in the morning. So did my wife, so did her mom who flew in that afternoon, and so did my mom.

Well, the nurses were doing there thing, and my wife was starting to have contractions, and then they decided to quit what they were doing and let her rest. My mom and her husband then headed back to Salem, and I took my mother in law back to my place. I spent the night in the hospital.

The next day, they decided to start over. This time, they went further and started giving her the drip(I forget what the stuff they use is called). Well, there were no visible contractions on the monitor that day. It seemed like all the progress that was made the day before was trashed by the decision the night before. That night, they took her off the machines and she was able to shower and move around. I grabbed her a sub at Quiznos. I spent the night at my place that night.

I arrived after 7am the next morning. They were getting her back on the drip and doing it all over again. By now, I was very unimpressed with this place. I am sitting on the couch reading, and there was a small group of nurses in there talking about all this. One was saying how this whole thing was pointless and was not going to work. She was one of the nurses from the day before and I was less than impressed with her. Later that day, a midwife was in there, and they ran new blood pressure tests and they were looking good at the time. So, she started wondering why she was even in there, since her blood pressure looked fine. I was really starting to get pissed off at this point, especially since we have a midwife wanting to discharge my wife because her blood pressure looked fine, even though historically it had not been fine. Hell, my wifes doctor was in there the first day saying he was glad this was being done. Her blood pressure had gone through the roof!

Well, she was discharged that evening. She was ordered to go on strict bedrest. They were going to send a damn social worker over to make sure she was being taken care of, since they didn't want her getting out of bed for any reason(except for the obvious reasons). We let them know that sending someone over would not be needed. We then went home.

A problem started that night. The baby was normally very active and kicking up a storm. Well, now he wasn't, and the hospital said that if he doesn't move, even after using the normal tricks to wake up a baby, we were to give them a call. It had been hours without any movement from the baby. Corinna had an appoinment scheduled for that morning anyway, so they told us to get there right away. She got hooked up to the monitor. The babies heartbeat was strong, and he looked good on the ultrasound, except for one problem. He was not moving, and the nurse was getting concerned. That midwife from the day before was still there and said a doctor would be seeing us. The doctor and another midwife came in, and they wanted to take a different approach to inducing, and they said they were 95% sure this would work.

So, this is now a Friday, and she gets a new room and they start again. I left to get her things and pick up her mom. Things were progressing. She had the nurse she had the first day, who she really liked, and it really looked like the baby was finally on the way. While her mom and I were in the cafeteria eating lunch, the midwife broke her water. So, it was definitely going to happen. I was happy, and so was my wife, even though the pain was increasing. The baby was also moving around again.

Shift change.

I was really not liking their shift changes. It seemed that with every shift change, there would be a different approach to this whole thing, and this was no exception.

A new midwife came in and read all the info on what was going on. She started talking about some of her own ideas that she wanted to do. Internal monitoring, stuff like that. I left to take Corinna's mom home. When I got back, my wife was asleep, and all the machines were turned OFF!! What the fucking fuck??

The internal monitor that this midwife wanted to do didn't turn out well(won't mention how), so they abandoned that. They also decided to let my wife rest again, so all the progress was thrown out the window, again.

The next morning, that midwife was back in there, and told my wife that she didn't believe that her water had been broken. One of the nurses a little while later mentioned discharging her. At this point I was about ready to take Corinna out of there and run to another hospital. It was now Saturday, nothing was happening, they were talking about discharging her, and this midwife who stopped everything had the fucking nerve to say she didn't believe her. We waited for a few hours, and a doctor finally came in. A real doctor. Not a nurse or a midwife.

He was pretty somber when he came in. Someone must have told him that we were rather upset and that we had been through hell. He said he was just starting a 24 hour shift and that he wanted this baby born before his shift ended, and predicted it would happen early the next morning.

Things were once again progressing. He was in there a lot, which was more than we could say for the other doctors we had seen. I went home to get some rest and came back with my mother in law. The doctor wanted to run another internal monitor to get a better reading on how the baby was doing, and said the baby was still on track to be born early in the morning. My mother in law and I decided to go to lunch.

On our way back, as we were passing the nurses station, one of the nurses is asking a guy in scrubs if he was there for the C-Section. Alarms started going off in my head. Somehow, I knew it was for Corinna. We entered the room and yes, it was. Corinna was sitting up and there were a few nurses in there. The doctor didn't like what he was seeing and decided that it was time for the baby to come out. They had my put on these uncomfortable scrubs(my shoulders are very broad and they felt tight), and I sat outside the operating room while they got ready.

A few minutes went by, and they called me in. They had me sit by her head, and they had a sheet setup to block everything that was going on. Good thing, I really did not want to see them cutting open her stomach.

C-Sections go pretty quickly. A few minutes later, they are telling me to stand to see the baby. After seeing him, I sat back down, and then he started crying. So did my wife. They wrapped him up in a blanket, put a cap on his head, and took him into the nursery. I followed.

Conner James Boles was born at 8:26pm on April 24th, 2004. He was 6 pounds 13 ounces.

You know how babies look when they are being born on TV or in movies? Well, they really do not look like that... heheheheh.

They put him on this table that would keep him warm, and began doing their tests or whatever. I was not paying much attention, even though I was talking to the nurse. I was staring at the baby.

His arms and legs were moving a lot. They said it was a reflex, since he was not longer restricted in his movements. His eyes were opening just a little bit. He was already grabbing and holding on to my finger. They gave him his first bottle.

His face had some bruising on it. The worst of it was on his nose and upper lip. It looks like he was pushed against a bone for quite awhile. The overall bruising faded by the next day. The bruise on his lip is gone, and the one on his nose is now very faint. There is still one on his forehead, close to his eyes, but it is faint.

I was able to bring one family member at a time into the nursery to see him, so I first brought my mom, and then my sister. I then left the nursery to go see my wife. Our families left, and the baby joined us a little while later. My wife was finally able to hold him.

The nurses came in and showed me how to do some things, like feed him and change a diaper. I had to do a lot because my wife was recovering from surgery and hooked up to an IV. He was bathed.

We had him for over an hour, and noticed that he was making a noise when he breathed. The nurses took him back to the nursery, and I checked up on him a little while later. I was able to move in and out of there as often as I wanted.

He was cold, but they were able to warm him up and his breathing sounded better. They kept him in there for some time, and we were starting to get worried. I went to visit him a few times and a nurse finally told me a bit of what was going on. They did some bloodwork and his white blood count was low. For those that do not know, that is the immune system. I asked if it could be because he was premature, and they didn't give me much of an answer. It was hard getting any answers from these people.

We were told by a doctor that they wanted to keep him in the nursery for 48 hours for observation. They had him hooked up to an IV with antibiotics and were running a blood culture to check for infections. We were able to visit him as often as we wanted, and we did. A lot. People came to see him, pictures were taken, etc. I hated having to keep him in there, but I suppose it was for the best. 2 days later, the blood culture was negative, and his white blood count was completely normal. I read on WebMD that a lowered immune system can be a side effect of a premature birth. Also, some said that the early problems could have been a result of the ordeal he went through the few days before he was born.

Unfortunately, we did not get to take him home with us. They were worried about his jaundice levels, and wanted to keep him under UV lights for awhile. The doctors told us that if it looks better that evening, we could take him home. Of course, the nurses were telling us there was no way that would happen, but whatever.

We arrived at about 8 that night to see him. We were told we could have him out of the lights for 30 minutes, so we changed and fed him. The nurse that was on duty(not the same as earlier), called the doctor to check on the current results. The baby came home with us that night. We did have to bring him back the next day for bloodwork to check his jaundice levels, but they came back good, even though the nurse that next day told us that they would most definitely be keeping him for awhile. In your face, bitch!!!

Conner is now 15 days old and is doing great. He has been getting lots of gifts in the mail, and is going to be very spoiled when he gets older.