The Hospital

My dad and his family came to visit while I was still "recovering".   (My recovery consisted of me staring at my once-beach-ball-sized stomach that now looked like it had popped).  While they were in meeting Ashley, the nurses came to take her to the NICU.  I wasn't there for this, but I was told that she would just be there for a few hours because her red blood cell count was high.  Apparently, when Elysha was born, Ashley suddenly got all the blood that she would have normally recieved plus all the blood Elysha normally recieved as well.  The nurses said she just needed to thin out her blood and everything else was how it should be.

They gave her a transfusion through her umbilical cord so it wouldn't hurt her.  The first time didn't work, so they needed to do it again.  The second time worked!  We were excited for Ashley to be able to join our family down in the nursery.  While Ashley got transfusions, we were with Elysha.  She was so alert and would sit and stare at us each in turn.  Our families all came to visit and meet her.  Everyone commented on how beautiful she was and how she looked like she had "pencil legs" because she was so skinny and long.

Elysha fell asleep, so we got a chance to go visit Ashley.  The NICU was on the next floor up, so Christian wheeled me to the elevator.  Christian's idea of wheel chair rides consists of popping wheelies and pretending to push me into the wall.  I have to say, the hospital would have been a lot more boring without those rides.  

I hated seeing Ashley in the NICU.  She was strapped to all these tubes and monitors that made it look like she wasn't going to make it another hour.  The nurses said she was fine, but it still scared me to see her like that.  They said that as soon as she ate a good meal they would take her to the nursery because nothing was wrong with her.  When we first came to visit her, I felt like the nurse was 'monitoring' us to make sure we weren't going to break her or something.  I would touch her foot and she would laugh and say "Oh, don't do that, it will overstimulate her."  I would hold her and she would laugh again and say "You need to hold her higher up".  Once she dropped a bottle that was still in the plastic onto the floor and she threw it away.  When Christian asked why she laughed again and said "You never give babies things off the floor".  And the plastic wrapping is good for what... ?  Talk about a confidence boost for new parents, eh?

 

Our goal in life those few days was to get Ashley to learn how to nurse.  She was 4 1/2 lbs and just didn't really have the strength to do it.  The nurses, however, refused to let her come down to the nursery until she learned (even though nothing was wrong with her).  She would cry, they would call me, I would waddle as fast as my sore little body would take me to her, and by the time I got there she was asleep again.  They saw she wasn't eating and tube fed her.  I was SO mad that they didn't even ask me if that was ok with me.  They were so against bottle feeding that they were willing to tube feed until the baby learned to nurse.  At this point, I realized that if we didn't bottle feed her and teach her how to eat that way, she would be in the hospital for a long time.  

I was also trying to feed Elysha at the same time.  They got hungry at the same time, so it really wasn't possible since they were on different floors of the hospital.  Elysha went to bottle feeding with her dad.  We liked watching how much she ate on the lines of the bottle.  Again, we thought she was probably the smartest and hungriest 4 lb baby around.  I thought that since Elysha was bottle feeding, Ashley might be able to as well.  Of course, the nurses disagreed, (laugh) "If she is too tired to breast feed, she will be too tired to bottle feed".  (laugh again) Bah, I could spit.  She then said "We decided to tube feed her every few hours instead".  Some nerve split in me as my new mama bear (ah!) qualities came in.  I told the nurse that I was the mother of Ashley, not her, and that we were going to bottle feed her, just for the hospital stay.  She said that if we started on bottle feeding, we would never be able to get her to nurse, but in the end she let us bottle feed her.  

These two days in the hospital were the worst days of their lives so far.  I'm not trying to be pessimistic, it was just how it was.  I had two babies to take care of on different floors of the hospital.  I would walk myself up and down the halls after I had just given birth, which hurt a little bit.  I couldn't feed them both when they needed to be fed, I couldn't rock them both to sleep.  I felt like I was neglecting Ashley when I was down with Elysha and that I was neglecting Elysha when I was up with Ashley.  I never would wish anyone to have a baby in the NICU, not even my worst enemy.  And this only lasted two nights!!

Alas, we left the hospital with both our healthy babies in tote.  Christian was happier than I had seen him in weeks and I almost cried with relief at being able to leave the grounds after almost a month of staying there.  I was so excited to start our new life with these girls.  We drove home smiling the whole way.  And this was while I was sore and squished between two carseats in the backseat.  Oh and guess who I proved wrong??  My babies both breast feed now.  That'll show her!  Ha!