The big move to Dayton Childrens

One of the best things that you can do for your child I believe and this is my opinion is to talk to them. Tell them about everything. What their siblings did that day, what you did. How you feel about them. Give them little pep talks. Let them know that you are there. Preemies get so agitated with touch because their nervous system is so under developed that the most that you can do is talk to them. And your love can shine through in your voice. Even reading them a story. Which we read many a book to him. Just so that they hear your voice. JT would calm down when we talked to him. He wasn’t one to get very agitated but, when he did, a nice calm authoritative voice soothed him. That and his binkie, (pacifier). He loved that thing. When JT was given his first feeding through his NG tube when he was 7 days old. ½ ounce breast milk and ½ an once of formula. The next day, his stomach started to distend and look a little purplish. He was starting to have very hard bowel movements also. They watched it for a few days. When he was 10 days old, I got a call from the hospital that they would have to move him so that they could do surgery, IF that is what I wanted. Otherwise, we could just let him stay as he was and just let nature take his course. I said, oh no!! We are going to do what we can to give him a chance. I told them under no circumstances was they to move my baby without me being there. This was the first of many emergency trips to the hospital. I was scared silly. I had no idea what was going to happen and they told me that he might not even make it the 4 minutes to Children’s. I was really scared, but, at peace with my decision. I knew that I had prayed and gave it to God and He knew what he was doing. I actually got there in record time. This was one of the few trips that my husband did take with me. I got there in time to sit with him for a while. It took 2 hours for the neonatal transport to get there. I was starting to get upset, because if this was such an emergency then why were they taking so long?
When they finally arrived. So much stuff started happening. They got report on what meds he was on his hyperal, all of his vitals, what settings where on his ventilator, and his history of surgeries and so forth. A lot of information, and most of which I didn’t understand. They had me take his temp and change his diaper. Oh man Oh man, was I scared. I knew they were having me do this because they thought that he wouldn’t make it to the hospital. Both of the transport team had another surprise in store for me. They kept telling me to come here. They needed my help with something that only I could do. I was scared to death because I had to climb through a lot of wires and tubes to get there. Next thing I know they are plopping him into my arms. I was in shock. They were bagging him so that they could get all of the ventilator lines switched over. That took probably about 1minute but, it felt like about 20. She kept telling me to just cover him with kisses, so that is what I did. I almost most drowned him with my tears. I never realized how heavy a baby that is bearly 2 pounds feels in your arms. I mean, he put a weight there. A weight that I couldn’t bear letting go of. A weight that I still ache for today. They finally got him all packed in the transport incubator. Let me explain this thing. It has everything on it that they will ever need. Monitors, ventilator, meds, you name it, it has it. Very awesome piece of machinery.

As we were going downstairs they told me not to be alarmed because they are going to have the sirens going. That is only so they can get there in a hurry. And under no circumstances are we to follow them. They said that would cause accidents. They gave us an alternative route to take. They also explained to us what was going to happen once he got up there. They let us know that it might take a long time to get him stable and set up before we got back there to see him. And then it would be a really quick visit and a quick talk with the surgeon. She gave me a packet with phone numbers in it and his number so that when I called I could get information. She also gave me a hug. I will never forget that. Both of them where so, I don’t know empathetic to the situation and they treated him so good and didn’t treat him like a number like he didn’t deserve to be treated with respect because he was broken.