Children's Hospital Plano, TX: April 2-5, 2012
I never expected to spend another stint in the hospital with our precious baby girl. However, if we had to spend almost a week in a hospital for Annelisa, this is the hospital that I would want to be admitted to.
The series of events that ended with us at Children's began on Thursday, March 29. We had my follow-up appointment with the lactation consultant at Centennial. This appointment was to check our progress in breast feeding by completing a weigh-feed-weigh, to check how much Annelisa was really getting from me. When Annelisa was weighed it showed that she had lost more weight since leaving the hospital. She did successfully eat 2 ounces of breast milk during the feeding, but since she was still showing some jaundice and had lost more weight our pediatrician needed to be called. The lactation consultant called the doctor for us and relayed all the details of our appointment. Our pediatrician wanted to see us the following Monday, April 2 for an additional weight check.
Monday, April 2, we went to the pediatrician for the weight check, Annelisa had lost more weight, she was down to 6 pounds, 12 ounces...she weighed 8 pounds at birth. In addition to the weight loss, her temperature was low, ranging from 95.5 degrees to 97.3 degrees during the appointment. (A low temperature can potentially be more dangerous than a high fever in young infants, because they could be too ill to mount a fever in response to a virus.) Plus the previous weekend, she had seemed extra lethargic. She wasn't waking to feed and just seemed too sleepy. Our pediatrician wanted me to supplement with formula until her two week check, but advised me to call if anything seemed off or if she developed fever. I was devastated from this appointment. I didn't want to supplement with formula again, I wanted to successfully feed my little girl. We went home with my mom to try to feed her 30 mL of formula in addition to breast milk during the subsequent feedings that afternoon. At the next two feedings, Annelisa hardly woke up, she wasn't feeding well. My mom and I worked very hard to keep her awake and try to keep her eating. After the first unsuccessful feeding, I called to talk to the doctor, she encouraged me to try again in three hours. So I tried again, knowing in my gut that something was wrong, very wrong. Annelisa was only 11 days old, I felt like I hardly knew what I was doing, yet, I knew something was wrong. I called the pediatrician again, knowing that we were likely going to the hospital. Our pedi, guided me through what to expect at the hospital ER and how to pack our things to be prepared. Then we left for Children's.
While at Children's my husband was amazing! (I think he's pretty incredible all the time, but he really was everything and more for Annelisa and me.) I was very emotional during our first days there. As a new mom, watching my little baby go through so much and not being able to take it away from her or make her feel better, was a very scary thing. The details of everything are clearer now, but during these days Christopher did a much better job of relaying the how and why of what happened.
Below is his summary of what occurred while we were at Children's.
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Because newborns have an almost non-existent immune system for the first month of life, it is standard practice for a spinal tap to be performed, IV antibiotics to be administered for at least 48 hours, and close monitoring for 48 hours. Hence the reason she was admitted so promptly.
Unfortunately, they had difficulty performing a spinal tap on her. Three different doctors attempted a spinal tap on her, and only the last doctor was mildly successful enough to get a little bit of spinal fluid that a culture could be run on (to test for meningitis, etc.). I was told the reason for the difficulty was that Annelisa had a “common anatomical anomaly” in which her sack of spinal fluid doesn’t extend as far down her spinal column as it does for most children. There’s nothing wrong with this condition other than the fact that it makes it extremely difficult to tap for spinal fluid. The doctor that was ultimately successful in getting fluid said that they encounter a baby like this once every year and a half. Therefore, apparently Annelisa’s special. :)
Ultimately all of her tests (urine, stool, blood, spinal fluid, etc.) came back negative for any infections. X-Rays also indicated nothing out of the ordinary. Plus, her heart rate, respiration, and oxygen levels were thoroughly monitored nothing seems to be wrong there. However, when her final spinal tap was being performed, she had explosive diarrhea that the doctor indicated was unusual and most likely indicative of some sort of virus.
Of course, the negative test results beg the question, what went wrong and why was the exact cause not determined? The doctor that monitored her and discharged her wasn't entirely sure why she had the symptoms she had. He presented two theories:
1) She had a “transient” virus that had already started to work its way through her system by the time we took her to the hospital, and therefore, was not picked up by the lab tests and stool cultures. There is a good chance this is the case given the diarrhea she had during her spinal tap.
2) She merely was having trouble feeding and got off track which led to dehydration. All of the nurses and doctors have encouraged us that any feeding issues were not our fault because feeding at this age is a two way street. Allison was doing what she was supposed to be doing but for whatever reason, Annelisa appears to have struggled a little bit figuring out how all of this works.
Regardless, during her hospital stay she improved dramatically. In particular, she put on 12 ounces almost overnight and left the hospital weighing over 7.5 pounds. Plus, her coloring and demeanor improved dramatically and she started feeding a lot better.
Since getting home, Annelisa has performed like a champ. She is eating well regularly, and her urine and fecal output is gloriousJ She seems like a normal baby now.
In spite of the challenges and uncertainty associated with the hospital stay, I believe a couple of blessings have resulted from it:
1) Given that Allison had polyhydramnios during pregnancy which can sometimes be associated with a defect in the child, we were still a little worried that something wrong would pop up with Annelisa. However, given all of the tests and monitoring that were performed on her during her hospital stay, we feel pretty confident now that any major problems have been ruled out so we don’t have to anxiously await for something bad to be discovered.
2) Trying to care for a newborn covered in wires while staying in a single hospital room without your usual stuff (such as a bed, swing, etc.) is quite difficult. Suddenly, the prospect of caring for a baby at home doesn’t seem so daunting in comparison.
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All in all, we were so thankful to have tons of love, support, and prayers from friends, family, and acquaintances while at Children's. God was so good to guide the doctors and nurses to help our little Annelisa get well. I told the nurse that discharged us on the 5th, that they were all wonderful and that I hoped to never see them in that same way again.
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| Precious Annelisa all hooked up to her IV. So thankful that she is well! |
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| Going home from Children's! Check out my shades! :) |
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