Bad Day

On Monday afternoon while at home eating lunch before heading to the hospital for my afternoon visit with Nathaniel I received a phone call from Dr. Chapman. She needed consent to give Nathaniel a blood transfusion. My heart sank to my knees as I learned that within an hour after I had talked to the morning nurse and learned that he was doing great (they had even removed his IV) he was having episodes of apnea. The doctor told me his red blood cell count was way down therefore he was anemic and they also thought he may have an infection. The plan was antibiotics for the infection and a blood transfusion for the low red blood cell count. When Jenny and I arrived at the hospital he had been moved back into the NICU and looked so pale and sick. The first transfusion was being done - yes I say first because he needed another one later that night. He was back on the nasal cannula to make breathing easier but they mentioned the possible need to but him on a ventilator if he continued to have episodes with apnea. We stayed with him all afternoon and evening and before we left the color in his face was better but the rest of him still looked very sick. I spoke to the head doctor and nurse practitioner before I left Monday night and learned that because his blood pressure and heart rate had been good all day hopefully things would be fine but they would make no guarantees and call me if he got worse. They also said that the blood test and x-rays done to check for infection had all come back negative. They took more blood and a urine sample to culture just to make sure. He was also taken off the breast milk and they don't plan to start it back until sometime on Wednesday. Needless to say we got no sleep Monday night and I returned to the hospital Tuesday morning to spend the day with him.
Thankfully Tuesday was a new day and after the second blood transfusion his color was back to normal, red blood cell count up to 45, and he was a lot more alert and seemed back to his old self. He will remain on the antibiotics for the next week (even though we still don't have any sign of infection) and is still on the nasal crannula until they feel confident that his breathing is stable enough to remove it. Nathaniel and I had a nice day together and I got to hold him for several hours skin to skin. His weight dropped on Monday night to 3lbs 3oz but at last nights (Tuesday) weigh in he was back to 3lbs 4oz.