Takdbrown

I noticed that some are wondering how things are going. My schooling started on August 27th and is a lot more than I expected. On top of my own two children I have taken on watching my newborn & 5yr old niece. the homework load is extreme but I must say that I am glad to be doing what I am doing. I just need to balance better. My son is doing okay. We are looking at the possibility of two different surgeries coming up. One involves his vocal cords and the factor that they are paralyzed and the opening isn't very big so it makes him have breathing issues and since the nerves aren't seeming to be returning they are thinking surgery is needed. The second surgery may be for his reflux yet again. He has already had two stomach wraps (Nissen Fundoplications) and the first one was too loose and this one he just had in May is intact but he is refluxing straight through it. He is till a very happy boy and he is still progressing quite well in other aspects. He is now army crawling everywhere and he will take steps so long as we are holding both his hands.

The moment you look at the pregnancy test and see that the result is a positive, you're entire world automatically changes whether it is your first pregnancy or your tenth. You have 40 weeks, maybe less depending how far along you were when you found out, to prepare for this new bundle of joy. Most parents are hoping for either a girl or a boy, while some just merely pray for a healthy baby. I was one who was hoping for a boy seeing as though we already had our little girl. At 12 weeks on a Friday, a doctor told me that I was having an inevitable miscarriage and to go home and rest because there was nothing they could do. I was instructed to make an appointment with my OB for Monday and I did as I was told. The OB ordered an ultrasound STAT and performed it himself. There on the screen was our precious baby still alive and swimming around inside me After that mishap my perspective changed and all I could hope for was that my baby was healthy. The pregnancy continued well after that with the exception that I was huge rather quickly for no apparent reason considering nausea was occurring 24/7. At 29 weeks I went in for an unplanned visit due to some irregular pains, only to find out I was dilated and in premature labor and had very high amniotic fluid levels. It took over a week to keep my labor at bay well enough to move me out of the labor room and into a regular room. It took another two weeks of bed-rest in the hospital before i was able to leave and be with my 2 year old daughter; unfortunately I wasn't able to go home because I would be too far away from the hospital so we stay at one of the hospitality houses with me on strict bed-rest. Almost a week went by, putting me at 33 weeks, and I woke abruptly in the middle of the night because my water broke. Within 4 1/2 hours my beautiful son had entered the world and was being whisked away to the ICU. He was found to have a condition known as Tracheal Esophageal Fistula (TEF) & Esophageal Atresia (EA). Automatically I knew he would need to be transferred to a different hospital to receive the proper medical attention he would need. At two days old my son received a major surgery to repair the TEF & EA, and within a couple of hours, he was back in the OR having emergency surgery to repair a hole in the back of his trachea caused by his ET Tube. Part way through the surgery my son went into complete cardiac arrest and died on the table, the doctor said they were trying everything they could, and managed to save him, but if it had been a matter of seconds more, then he wouldn't have made it. My son continued to have many problems and still does to this day. He was on a ventilator for over two month, coded twice, stopped breathing multiple times, required oxygen, has chronic lung disease, had a tracheostomy and requires a feeding tube. I was unable to hold him until he was 6 weeks old and unable to touch him for the first 3 weeks of his life in which he was kept paralyzed. He was in the NICU for the first 5 months of his life and has been in and out many times ever since. He is a year and a half now and has had more than 14 surgeries. Due to all these events in my life, I met some amazing people, but what helped keep me strong through everything was his nurses. They made such an impact on our lives, and it made me reconsider what I wanted to do with my life. Watching them every day through the ups and downs made me realize that I have the strength I never thought possible and that I want to make a difference in other people's lives just as they did for me. My son is doing much better now, still has a lot going on but we have adjusted accordingly, and it became clear to me that it was time to start college for nursing. I will be starting in Fall of 2012 and I'm pretty excited. I have my son & his nurses to thank for the path I am taking.