Learning to Trust

This is our little Micah now!! The first pic we have with no tubes on his face and only one IV in his hand!:)

The day after surgery

The day before surgery

3days old

After a rough first day a life

So lets start at the beginning..... on the 22 of Nov. I go into the hospital after taking my in-laws for a walk on the pier and thinking my water broke! I arrive at the hospital and it has indeed sprung a leak, but no dilation. So I am told if I haven't gone into labor by morning they will start me! I spend the night in the hospital, a place I hate to be! in the morning around 11 I am started on "The Drip" no one wants this because it is horrible, but my baby will for sure be there soon so I deal with each contraction as they come! James is finally aloud in to see me at 5:30pm and not a minute earlier (very strict visiting hours in fact only 2! A nurse comes and asks if I can feel the lovely contractions I am having (the lady in the bed moans and cries through each one, I prefer silent tolerance) I tell her I do and they decide to move me down to labor and delivery ( I must be at least 5cm I think) WRONG...I am about a 2 barely even open and it is now 7:30 and I have been on the PIT for over 8 hours! But as they give me the options for pain management I realize that if I want James in the room I cant have any drugs! I tell the nurse I want to use the mental pain management technique she told me she would go get a midwife and I almost yelled at her that i don't want a midwife i want my husband! She looks at me and then reluctantly agrees! James is aloud in for 20 minutes before another nurse kicks him out! It is now nearly 9 and I am still at a 2! SO i fight through contractions till 1:00 am and then after 13 hours on this drip and 28 hours of no food i cant do it anymore! I tell the nurse to check me and if i am not close i need an epidural. SO they check me and i am maybe 3cm the nurse says! I lose mental pain management and tell her I want the epidural NOW! She agrees and gets the lady to give it to me as they are getting me ready for it I start to feel funny! The lady says I must hold still but I can't my body wont! I tell her I don't want it till I know what is wrong and then a nurse asks if I feel like I want to push? That is how I feel but she had just said i was only a 3 so she checks again and I am now 7 and the baby is on his way( this means no epidural) so i call James and tell him to get here FAST! The three nurses then tell me I need to relax and they all leave the room! What a great idea! I call James and he talks me through a few more contraction so I don't push but finally I cant help it I push weather I want to or not! He tells me to yell and that he is almost there! I yell help as a nurse walks past my door she comes in crosses my legs and tells me to relax till she can get help! I try to relax but there is nothing I can do he just came out! Micah James was born at 1:37 am on Nov 24th and weighed 4.25kg the nurse was there to catch him and James arrived seconds later when I asked if he was here and they told me his was in the hall! I nearly lost it because I knew they weren't letting him in! SO he was allowed in and we loved our little boy! This is where things went a different direction then what we thought...........He was born very blue and after 2 hours was still blue but nursed and was breathing well so they tell me some babies just take longer to get color and that he will be brought to me shortly and we are both moved to different floors(me to recovery and him to pediatrics) the next thing I remember is a nurse coming in and telling me she needs blood for my baby and that he has been moved to ICU and someone will be there shortly to take me to him!! I call James and ask what is going on he says he will tell me when I get here but that Micah has something wrong with his heart! We end up finding our that he has transpositions of the greater arteries and will be rushed to another hospital where he will have emergency surgery! (one thing you must know is that getting out of this hospital is like trying to get out of jail) i am told i have to stay at least 24 hours but James gets in a taxi and races to the hospital! Finally a nurse who is in charge of mental heath after birth comes to talk to me! She sees I have been crying and tells me it is natural to feel depressed after having a baby! I tell her my situation and she realizes why I am crying! She gets the doc to release me on account it is not healthy for me to be a room with 10 other women and there babies when mine my not live! So i am released to my in-laws as long as I go straight home! I do and James waits for the baby to get out! That first day is kind of a blur after that! They say his first procedure went well and they will now wait a week before preforming open heart surgery! The first week was filled with ups and down as I saw him improve and got to hold and feed him knowing that on on Tues the 30th he would be put back to square one and we would once again be back in limbo! The 30th came, James and I were at the hospital at 8 in the morning and 8 hours later I saw my 6 day old baby wheeled out with more tubes them baby! They told me to wait and a doctor would be out to talk to me! 2 hours later they let me in and the doctor explains that they had to leave his chest open in case they need to go back in! I look at my little baby who is being kept alive by more machines then I have ever seen and who chest is still open and decided it was time to go home and prep for the weeks ahead! The next few weeks all kind of mesh together! For 2 weeks we were aloud to see our baby for 2 hours a day, he was sedated and so we would sing to him and talk, we could only touch the top of his head so that is what we did! Once his chest was closed we were also given a hand to touch! We saw him take steps forward and take steps back, Go through more procedures and then get better. Finally on Tuesday the 14th of Dec. he was moved from the surgical cardiac ICU to the NICU! This means we can see him from 10-10! Finally on Wednesday I was able to hold him and James got in to hold him today! He is an angel and we love him so much! His surgery was a success and now we just have to wait for him to finish a treatment because he got an infection in his opening, but at least we will get him home and that is what we want most! Maleah has still only seen pics but she loves them and always tells me she loves baby Micah! She has been a champ through the whole thing! I told James that he could add anything to my story when I wrote this blog, but he has about 40 pages written in his journal about his perspective so hopefully one day I can get him to publish his on here too. We love our little Micah!