Our Little Fighter, Day 6

It's now been six days since Benton was born and to say that these days have been a roller coaster both emotionally and physically would be the understatement of the century.  Here are the latest updates to catch everyone up on Benton's progress and sharing the story of how Joe and I became parents...

On the day Benton was born, Joe had the honor of seeing him within the first 15 minutes of his life after they stabilized him.  When Joe first saw him, Benton had a heartbeat but his breathing was extremely labored and he wasn't moving.  The NICU doctor reminded Joe that he was extremely premature and they would do what they could.  They sent Joe back out to wait for Benton to stabilize and 10 minutes later the doctors came back to the waiting room and told Joe "he's breathing a little better now and he's starting to move".  Benton looked world's better and was breathing normally with a ventilator and stretching his little arms and legs.  This was the start of our little fighter making his momma and daddy very proud.  Once Marika was out of surgery and coming off the anesthesia she got to visit the baby and see his little tiny footprint.  Later that night, we went back to see Benton a second time because the first time Marika felt that the pain killers were interfering with her interaction with Benton.  This second visit, Marika went out of her way to avoid the prescription painkillers so she was less loopy.  He was small but he was our miracle.

Saturday November 9th was Benton's 1st day-a-versary.  Joe and I made sure we were present at Benton's bedside to sing him happy birthday on the one day anniversary of his birth.  Seeing him struggle and be at the mercy of a multitude of machines was one of the hardest moments in my life.  Every few seconds another alarm or bell beeps signaling either a new medicine needs to be administered or the heart rate monitor, blood pressure monitor, breathing tube monitor or heat monitor had registered an unhealthy level.  Without understanding all of the numbers on the monitors it can be utterly terrifying to sit in the NICU beside your baby.  With every sound your heart jumps and you pray that the alarms are not for your little boy.  It's obvious that this NICU experience will be one of the more trying moments in our lives.

Sunday November 10th was Benton's 2nd day-a-versary.  During our visit to the NICU we had the opportunity to discuss Benton's progress with the senior NICU doctors and hear about the issues we were about to start dealing with on a daily basis as parents of a micro-preemie.  Listening to the doctor's concerns for our baby and how they would handle each possible complication was both terrifying and reassuring.  It was obvious that our baby was in the best possible care but everything with a tiny preemie is extremely tenuous.  One of the main issues they raised was the PDA duct of our boy.  The PDA duct is a valve between the heart and lungs that naturally is open while the baby is in the womb but closes before birth.  With that duct still open Benton was having a harder time breathing and he was getting a small amount of blood in his lungs.  To help fix the duct the doctors prescribed him a course of 3 doses of ibuprofen which should help to reduce the size of the duct.  That evening Benton had his first dose of the ibuprofen drip which should help him but has also caused his blood pressure to rise.

Monday November 11th was Benton's 3rd day-a-versary and the day he was baptized.  Visiting Benton in the NICU  was extremely special because I was able to finally touch my son's hand and place light pressure on him (which is the equivalent of holding a preemie).  The nurse on duty, Laura, was such a sweet heart and she truly wanted to make sure we got some great photos of Benton with me and Joe holding hands in his crib, laying a pen down next to him so we could compare his size, and placing my wedding ring on his arm.  It truly is unbelievable how small he is, but it becomes truly obvious when you see my size 4 wedding band hanging off his arm like a bangle.  While visiting Benton, Laura let us know that they could easily arrange a baptism for our little guy.  Since we had a lot of family in town we decided to hold the baptism that very day.  Father Joe from the chaplain's office performed the baptism and we had a little white biblical christening gown laid on top of Benton.  The ceremony was beautiful and the NICU allowed us to have the entire family present at his bedside to participate.  Seeing my beautiful baby boy baptized before God left me feeling peaceful and serene.  It was so nice to know that God would be watching over my miracle baby and that everyone's thoughts and prayers could be channeled toward our precious boy.

Tuesday November 12th was Benton's 4th day-a-versary and the day I was discharged from the hospital.  While still in the hospital we visited Benton multiple times especially since his blood pressure had been getting very high due to the ibuprofen drip that had been given to him to help his PDA duct.  The discharge process from the hospital was highly emotional since I couldn't bring my precious baby home and would no longer be just steps away from his room on a 24/7 basis.  It's hard to comprehend how to deal with everything having to do with your own personal recovery while constantly thinking about being near your baby during his time of need in the NICU.  Even with all the emotions its important to remember that the NICU is the absolute best place for Benton to be right now and we will just have to be strong.  Once we were fully discharged and relaxing at home I called the NICU to check on my beautiful boy.  The nurse let us know that things were going fine, but that he had developed a skin infection since his skin is so thin and can't hold up well to moisture.

Yesterday was Benton's 5th day-a-versary.  My dad, Joe and I all went to visit Benton for his birthday but they were performing a lot of procedures on him.  First he needed a chest x-ray because his breathing tube was too shallow and then they needed a second chest x-ray to confirm they had moved the tube into the correct position.  Then he needed a renal ultrasound to check his kidneys, a echocardiogram to check his PDA duct and the addition of caffeine to help his breathing.  While we were at the NICU for a large chunk of the afternoon we really felt like had barely gotten to see him.  Luckily we decided to go back that evening for a second visit.  Not only did he look so much better and more relaxed during the evening, but his nurse was able to give us the results for the multitude of tests he had endured during the day.  The echocardiogram showed that the PDA duct had gotten smaller and the renal ultrasound came back with no issues.  Both nuggets of news made us smile the biggest I had all week.  To cap off the night we started a new tradition with Benton where we read him a little golden book before bed time.

Today is Benton's 6th day-a-versary.  We went to visit our resident cutie and sang him happy birthday right at 11:41am.  Visiting him on the anniversary of his birth has become my favorite activity and the happiest part of my day.  When we arrived today, Katie, Benton's nurse, was setting up a morphine drip for Benton because they were about to redo his skin bandages and that always gets him riled up and the morphine calms his blood pressure down during these traumatic experiences.  Once the morphine had been administered Katie helped me to take his temperature, change Benton's diaper for the first time and also help change his bandages.  Changing a diaper on a micro-preemie is daunting to say the least, but the feeling I felt by helping participate in his "cares" was one of the best ever.  Today we also received the amazing news that the potential brain bleed they saw on his head ultrasound wasn't worrisome and Benton was ready for food for the first time ever.  They added a feeding tube and gave him his first vial of milk today.   Hopefully with his mother's milk he will be able to grow big and strong very soon.