I had Strep B and was supposed to have antibiotics in my system so many hours before giving birth but it didn't happen and poor Drew had to have an IV taped to his right arm in order to have antibiotics pumped into his body every few hours as a precautionary measure in case he contracted the Strep B (which he didn't, thank heavens!). Then, they found a heart murmur and one of the stupid male nurses told me (a brand new mom) that it was the loudest heart murmur he had ever heard. On top of all that, he had jaundice. We were supposed to go home on Friday, but Andrew had to stay one more day in order to make sure his jaundiced levels were dropping and the strep culture was negative. So we left Saturday at 11:30 am. My sister Shannon brought us home because Cesar was sleeping in order to go to work that night. My mom and Jenny were already in Utah, but had gone to SLC to do some geneology work.
That first week is really a blur, but luckily my mom was here to take care of me and deal with all the doctors. (A picture of my mom and me during the week she was here).
The day after Andrew came home, we had to go back to the hospital to check his billirubin levels. Then that Monday we had to go to Primary Children's to get his heart checked out--we were there for like 6 hours! He had an EKG and also an ultrasound of his heart. Dr. Everett, who is a saint, sat us down and told us that he had a medium sized hole in his left ventricle. These holes are very common and usually close up. If they do not close up, they are very easily correctable. But she thought Andrew's hole would close up because it was in the muscle. So that was a relief. My mom took Cesar and I out to lunch at Ruby River in SLC and it was really the first time I could enjoy being a new mom.
Wednesday (7 days after Andrew was born), I developed a very painful urinary tract infection. My OB-GYN prescribed me pain pills and an antibiotic to get rid of it. The antibiotic was secreted through breast milk and had a side-effect of harming the baby's heart. I called my OB-GYN and told them that Andrew already had a heart problem and I didn't want to take the chance of causing more damage and asked them to prescribe a different antibiotic. They said they could but that I was guaranteed a yeast infection. At that point I broke down with the horrible UTI pain and exhaustion and my mother took over and called the pediatric cardiologist, the pharmacist, the pediatrician, and the OB-GYN in order to find out what medication I could take that would not harm the baby and would not give me a yeast infection. I just took a normal antibiotic and then an hour after taking the antibiotic I would take an acidophilus pill and I ate yogurt. I did not get a yeast infection and was cured in a week.
I had taken a pain pill for the UTI that made my pee a bright orange and Andrew's diaper had bright orange spots in it for a few days. I mentioned this to the pediatrician at our visit on Friday (10 days after Andrew was born), she said, "Oh, he's dehydrated". At that point, we knew he wasn't getting enough milk from me (which in the hospital, he wasn't getting enought either because he hadn't peed or pooped after 24 hours, so we had to supplement with formula and he peed fine and pooped once). He also had not pooped since the hospital, which was concerning so the pediatrician told me to supplement with formula and if he didn't poop by Sunday at noon, that we would have to bring him in to do tests in order to make sure there was not a more serious problem.
Sunday at 11:55 am, he pooped! My mom wanted to take a picture, but I thought it was too gross. He still isn't a very big pooper, he's an every other day kinda guy.
The first 6 weeks were rough. I was slightly crazy with all the hormones and having a brand new baby and figuring out where I fit in our new family. Cesar was very patient and understanding. In fact, I asked him a few weeks ago if he realized that I was crazy and he said he had no idea.
(The reason why Andrew's nickname is "chupa dedo", because 20 minutes after being born, he found great delight in sucking on his fingers!)
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