NICU Stay

The picture is Alex changing his first dirty diaper.

Liam stayed a total of 11 days in the NICU and was discharged on November 20th, just in time for Thanksgiving. He was a little impatient, like Mommy and wanted to leave earlier.

The biggest obstacle was teaching him how to eat. He had a feeding tube but after the first few days, no longer needed to use it. So he decided to rip it out himself. Twice. The nurses kept telling us he was one of the feistier guys they had.

Then after he began eating, they began to slow down the fluids for his IV and completely turn the fluids off. Well, he decided to rip that out of himself as well. Sigh.

The circumcision was probably the worst thing we experienced at the hospital. Oops, they forgot to give him topical anesthetic or sweets, sugar water helps numb their pain level. My little man is a strong kid, he just wanted to get the hell out of dodge after that one.

Alex and I decided he should save his time off for the surgery and go back to work immediately. He would drop me off every morning around 8am at the hospital and he would come to NICU immediately after work, about 6pm. We then left every night around 11pm. It was a lot of long days but we both learned a ton from the NICU staff and the nurses there are angels. I cannot say enough about how wonderful they treated Liam and Mommy, especially because I probably asked a ton of questions and took over like a Mama Bear. It gave me time to call around the country and learn more about his surgery, more than I would have at home as I have learned since.

NICU is one of the tougher obstacles I've endured and any parent who has seen their child hooked up to machines, in incubators, uncomfortable and inconsolable, I have the most respect in the world for you. Liam was not in terrible shape and we learned we could be in a worse place. Again, unbelievably thankful for the little man and the Big one watching over us.