Still catching up

Why is it that I spend so much time reading other's blogs rather than updating my own?

I know I promised a synopsis of Jayla's stay in the NICU so, here goes:
The morning after her birth, my husband and I went down to the NICU to visit her (this was not without immense pain and alot of whining required to get me from the bed to the wheelchair). We were told that she would be going into surgery later that afternoon. They weren't sure yet what they were going in to operate on so they wanted to do a "study" in the morning. We got there just before they were going to take her down to radiology for the study. While we were visiting with her, one of the hospital employees in the NICU walked up to us and said that we looked familiar. It turns out that she attends our church and recognized us from when we were in leadership in the Newlyweds Sunday School class. We have since moved out of that class, obviously, but she remembered us as she was just coming in when we were going out. Anyway, she asked if she could pray for/with us before Jayla went in for her test. And that's what we did. The three of us formed a circle around Jayla and prayed. Amy (the girl) prayed that Jayla would not need surgery and would be healed if anything were actually wrong with her. Then we left and Jayla was taken to radiology.

Now, it turns out that the study that they wanted to do was to actually have Jayla consume a contrast that would outline her system on x-rays. This was in hope of giving them an idea of where her intestinal obstruction might be. The contrast doubled an enema, which was key because as they watched it go through her system, it started to unplug her. It turns out that she just had a plug of meconium that she couldn't pass on her own. Upon seeing the plug start to "unplus", they did cancel surgery - all credit given to God and Amy's intecessory prayer for us. The contrast ended up going all the way through her system eventually, which was good news. And on the 6th day of life, Jayla was finally allowed to "eat". Food consisted of a teaspoon of water every 3 hours! They were extremely conservative doctor who were ultra-paranoid that Jayla's system wasn't right. On the 7th day of life, she finally got to consume a small amount of breastmilk. Things progressed day by day but, slowly. They fed and waited for her to poop. If she didn't poop, she didn't get to increase feeds the next day. It was a painfully slow process.

Then on the 5th day of feeds, her stomach became distended again, signaling that she was having blockage/backup issues again. It turns out that she never fully passed all of her meconium. She just couldn't do it on her own. So, they immediately stopped feeds and we had to wait 3 days on them to give her an enema. That was probably the hardest 3 days. We had to wait because they discovered the issue on Sunday morning and radiologist don't work on Sunday. The next day was Labor Day - obviously they can't work holidays either. Then when they got back on Tuesday, she wasn't considered an emergency case so they didn't get to her until late that afternoon. All this time, she is starving and looking at me like, "why can't I eat!?!??" They did get the enema and did several flushes. Finally, they resumed feeds (painfully small amounts again) when she was 2 weeks old. We progressed most days, although when there was no poop, the doctors wouldn't budge. Then on day 25, Jayla was allowed to eat whatever and whenever she wanted to. It was awesome except for trying to teach her to breastfeed at 3 weeks old! Then on day 27 (Sept 20), she was released!!

That was the hardest and most stressful time of my life. I was a zombie through the better part of it. My life stopped. I was at the hospital for 12-14 hours for every single day of her stay. I wept daily for my child. I wept at the hospital because she wasn't supposed to be there! I wept at home because I missed her so much. Through it all, I trusted God and knew that Jayla was fine. I can honestly say that I never doubted Him for that. But, that didn't make the separation from my baby any easier. It would probably have almost been easier if she were truly a sick child.

So, we get her home at almost 4 weeks old, both sets of grandparents have left to return to work and her daddy is back at work. So, it was just me and Jayla. The first day was really, really rough. For some reason, it was easier to care for her when I was surrounded by nurses in the NICU! But, what made the first day with her so hard was the fact that I was trying to learn to take care of her on my own and pack to evacuate Houston for Hurricane Rita!! Stressful, stressful...