Life at Home

We were discharged from the hospital Saturday afternoon and have been slowly adjusting to life at home. Unfortunately the transition hasn't been as smooth as we had envisioned, but we're still so very thankful.

Very early on Saturday morning (before we left the hospital), Caleb was diagnosed with jaundice. This is very common in newborns, and they think his jaundice is a result of the bruising on the top of his head from the delivery. Anyway, there are two common types of phototherapy treatment for jaundice. One is referred to as "the blanket", which is kind of funny because it's not a blanket at all. It's a pad that you place under the baby's back. What's nice about the blanket is that you can still hold your baby and move them around.

The second type of treatment is what I like to call "the light box" and basically looks like a tanning bed for babies. The light box is much stronger and more effective in treating jaundice but the baby just has to lay in this box alone all day (unless being fed or changed).

When we left the hospital, they were out of blankets, so we were sent home with a light box. Ryan and I had planned on spending the rest of the day as a family in bed, catching up on sleep and just being together, however, the light box changed that. Kind of a long story, but basically Caleb did not tolerate the light box well in the beginning. He had to lay in it with only his diaper on, which meant he couldn't be swaddled. At two days old, Caleb was definitely not used to being so free in his movements all day long, not to mention that all of his wiggling around was irritating his circumcision site.

It was heart breaking watching our two day old son lay in this box screaming incessantly and not being able to comfort him. We didn't keep him in the box constantly, and when we had his bilirubin levels checked at the hospital on Sunday morning, they had gone up. Our pediatrician then instructed us to keep Caleb in the light box AND on the light blanket at all times. Jaundice, though extremely common, can cause brain damage if not kept in check. We felt so bad and resolved to leave him there all day.

On Monday, his levels had dropped some, so we were told we could use either the blanket OR the light box. We decided to do the blanket during the day so we could still hold him when we wanted to and the box at night. On Tuesday morning, we had our first appointment with the pediatrician. They were very encouraged by his weight gain (8lb 10oz at birth, 8lb 4oz at discharge and 8lb 7oz yesterday), as well as his frequency of peeing and pooping. When we got the bilirubin results back yesterday afternoon, though, they had gone back up. This can be normal because the levels often peak around day 5-6, but they shouldn't keep going up. Because everything else looks so good (weight gain, peeing, pooping and his physical color--not too yellow), the pediatrician said we could discontinue the phototherapy and just let them know if there were any changes.

We go back on Thursday for another check up and ask that you would be praying that God would cure Caleb of his jaundice.

Now, on top of all of this, we discovered that Caleb was also tongue tied. The little piece of skin that connects your tongue to the bottom of your mouth extended all the way to the tip of Caleb's tongue. This is often hereditary (my brother had it) and is more common in males. Anyway, it often makes it difficult for the baby to eat because sucking is harder (though Caleb seems to be doing fine in this area), as well as later impeding speech development.

Yesterday afternoon, Caleb had his tongue clipped. It's a really easy procedure at this age and is even done without any anesthetic. If we had waited until he was 10 months, they would have had to put him under. It was so hard to hear him screaming in the next room, but he handled it like a champ and seems to be back to normal.

Everything is going more smoothly now, and we LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this little boy. It's so incredible to think about how long we have prayed for him and to now finally be able to hold him in our arms. Praise the Lord for His unwarranted goodness to us!