Carter Comes Home!

After eleven days in the NICU, Carter finally got to come home. That was the best day ever! We dressed him up in his blue puppy outfit from Grandma Bourland, loaded him into the then oversized carseat, and headed home. Ryan and I were so ready to have the "wireless" version of Carter. We gladly welcomed the sleepless nights, diaper changes, feedings, etc. We finally got to be Mommy and Daddy. Aunt Shannon, Cousin Jackson, and Cousin Blake were the first to visit. Both Blake and Jackson were very excited to get to hold their new cousin. Grandma and Grandpa Bourland were in Ashton, Idaho at the time. They literally drove through a blizzard to come and hold Carter. In fact, I don't think he was put down for the next two days while Grandma and Grandpa Bourland were here. Good thing Carter is a snuggler because we were all making up for the lost cuddle time.

Finally . . . we get to hold our baby!

Carter was in the NICU for nearly a week before we actually got to hold him. It was so hard to wait that long but of course we didn't want to risk his health. Initially, the doctors were worried that he had an infection in his lungs. It turns out that he didn't. His lungs were just premature. Once he received the second sufactant dose things started to make a turn for the better right away. It was such a joy to finally hold our baby in our arms. We take full advantage of the fact that we can do that as much as we want now. Carter was in the NICU for a total of 11 days, which felt like forever to us. After Carter's breathing was doing well we had to wait to make sure that he was eating OK. Since he had so much stress just trying to breathe, the doctors waited to feed him so that his system wouldn't get over stressed. Once he was getting food, it was through a feeding tube. Eventually, he started getting a bottle and then we started to mix in breastfeeding as well. At some feedings he was breast, bottle, and tube fed just to make sure that he was getting enough. Before we could take him home he had to be able to get enough to eat without the feeding tube. To make sure that he could eat enough without the tube Ryan and I actually stayed overnight with Carter in one of the rooms in the NICU. It is kind of like a test night before you get to take your baby home. You are completely on your own but Carter was still hooked up to all the monitors so that his oxygen levels and breathing rate could still be watched before he was officially released. The day after our test night, we got to take Carter home. We passed . . . Yeah!

NICU

Carter's arrival was definitely a surprise and quite the bumpy ride. I woke up Saturday morning around 7:30 am (three weeks before my due date) and just as I was rolling out of bed my water broke. Six hours later, Carter was here. I was told that first pregnancies usually go past the due date and the delivery lasts about 10-18 hours. That sure wasn't the case for me! I was only in the delivery room for about 30 minutes when Carter officially arrived. He weighed 6 lbs 5 oz and was 19 inches long. There wasn't enough time for an epidural but thank goodness I was able to have an intrathecal (sp?), which is pretty much a shorter lasting epidural. Thankfully, it lasted long enough. Overall, the delivery was the easy part. Little did we know that the hardest part was yet to come. I only got about 5 minutes with Carter before he was taken away because his breathing was very labored and hoarse sounding. It didn't take him long to end up in the NICU, where they placed a CPAP on him. A CPAP helps force oxygen into the lungs. Eventually, Carter required a couple doses of surfactant to help the air sacs in his lungs open more easily. They actually had to put a tube down his throat to do that. He was a little fighter, though. We were already so proud of our little guy.

Testing 1 2 3

So, this is officially my first blog ever. I guess we will see how this goes. I really need to catch up on a lot of pictures, considering Carter is now four months old. I will try my best to update our blog and then stay current. However, I now understand how difficult it is to find extra time with a little one in the house!