Today marks...

Today marks four months since Mason came home from the hospital. (Yes if you do the math that is a few days later than most babies) Those few days were some of the longest and hardest I had really had in a long time.

Mason was born late Wednesday night so we should have been home by Friday afternoon at the latest. Thursday day the nurses took Mason to do the normal newborn tests etc. Well after two hours we still hadn't seen Mason so Dan called the nursery to see where he was. They said he would be back soon. So finally he made it back to our room and the nurse informed us that he didn't pass one of the new tests that they perform on newborns so Friday morning he would have an echocardiogram.  But the nurse didn't seem to concerned about it.

Friday came and they took Mason for his echo. A few hours later we found out he was going to be admitted to the NICU. His pediatrician called me and explained that he had what is called PPHN. (Persistent Pulmonary Hypertension in Newborns). Basically means a valve that normally is opened in the womb and closes aftee birth was still open. It usually closes right away. But in some it takes a little longer and some it requires surgery.

So they took him to the NICU. Everytime someone would touch him his heart rate would spike.  After what seemed like an eternity, we were able to go and see him hooked up to all the tubes and IVs, etc.  The nurses told us we couldn't touch him at all when we went in to see him. Dan and his dad went in and gave Mason a blessing. Then I was able to go in and see him. After all the nurses left, when my mother in law and I were alone, I gently touched his leg and told him mommy was there and he calmed down a little since he had been crying. My heart broke seeing him hooked up to everything. 

Dan and I took turns staying the night to make sure he was taken care of and so we could do feedings. So Sat thru Mon, Mason had echos to make sure everything was getting better. It slowly did. So we thought we would get to come home on Mon and then Mason had a desaturation in his O2 levels so we had to stay one more day. Then he would do really well and then have another desat. It always happened when neither Dan or I were there :( but finally on Wed (1 wk later) we were finally able to go home.

6 weeks later we went back for another echo, which they found a heart murmur but it is normal in newborns so come the middle of April we have another follow up. His pediatrician sounds hopeful that his murmur is gone.
How thankful we are that it wasn't worse because quite frankly it could have been. And today he is such a happy little boy. Sure love his sweet smile.