Sweet Malachi

  As of Thursday, the NICU stopped the morphine. Malachi had done so well on the weening that they did not anticipate too much of an issue and thought he might be ready to come home on Friday. Well, he had a really hard Thursday night. He was extra irritated and was difficult to console.  On Friday, when the nurses evaluated, of course, they decided he was not ready to go home just yet. My husband took the day off in anticipation that we'd be bringing him home. So, we just enjoyed the day, worked on some stuff for Malachi and then headed to the hospital later in the evening. By that time, the hospital had decided to give Malachi a spot dose of morphine. Big mistake. Big. HUGE.  In an effort to see what was happening at night - since Malachi seemed mostly fine during the days - I decided to stay Friday night with him. What a nightmare!!!! Even after the spot dose of morphine, he could NOT. BE. CONSOLED. The nurse, who had never cared for him, basically left me alone to dea...

Because everything happened in REVERSE and FAST and FURIOUS, we did not have a chance to set up Malachi's room yet. Facebook Marketplace has been so helpful in purchasing gently used items at a reasonable price (crib, bassinet, baby monitors, bottles, etc)  Husband setup his crib this morning. It was a doozy! He swears the people we bought it from got it from TEMU! LMAO! If that's the case, we should've been able to put it together with scotch tape, right?! Anyways, it was a bit more complicated than we thought, but he got it DONE! The room which once held a queen size bed and our old dresser/chest of drawers now has a crib and glider chair and ottoman. Still need to hang some pictures and clean out the drawers to make room for Malachi's clothes, but we are much closer to having the room setup for him. Maximus has been sniffing around and wondering what the heck we are doing. I keep telling him it's all for his baby brother to which he looks at me like "Where i...

Malachi has been a trooper this week. On Tuesday, when the doctor called, she explained that he was still dealing with irritability related to the withdrawal, so they decided to increase his medication. Ughh... now he is over .60 of morphine. Our poor little guy!  They left him on this dose for Tues and Wed. When the doctor evaluated on Thursday morning, they decided to start the weening process. They have now decreased the med 3 days in a row and Malachi is holding his own! We are so pleased with this and are hopeful the worst of the withdrawal is over! As of today, he is on .43 and still eating like it's his job!  He had a sweet little nurse named Maddie on Thursday day and then Friday night. She was so good to him and I liked her approach to his care. If only all of the nurses were like her :) She even did a couple of crafts with his footprints and they are adorable. Husband and I just cannot wait to bring this sweet boy home. He is two weeks old and has spent the bulk of t...

The night/morning in the  NICU with baby boy has been interesting. Some of the nurses have been fantastic and others have been trash. First nurse I met was Olivia (I know, same name as the birth mom). Ironic right? Almost as ironic as the nurse on the original floor named Crystal and the attorney lawyer named Crystal. I guess the universe is confirming it's meant to be. Anywayssss, Olivia was so sweet. She came in frequently to check on me/baby boy. She asked questions about whether I was a new mom and then she provided extra tips and support. She was the day shift nurse so once 7pm hit, she was off duty. Next up were 2 nurses (one regular, one training) that start with K. I didn't learn their names because they did the bare minimum and only really came in at the 3-hour cadence for his med and bottle. Another nurse who was sitting outside of our room popped in and talked about seeing him the night before. Her name was Krishna (or something like that). She snuggled him, she came...

I don't know a whole lot, but want to document what I do know - for future reference for baby boy! I will do a post like this periodically as I learn more about her from her parents or her directly. 1. She loves cereal. All kinds of cereal. Cinnamon toast crunch (my fave), frosted flakes and fruity pebbles 2. She takes her cereal with almond milk because she's lactose intolerant. She didn't learn that until she was older  3. She is fiercely protective of her younger brother - often sacrificing herself and taking punishments to save him  4. She was a girl's girl growing up, but she is athletic and can hang with the boys. She can be scrappy!  5. She likes organization and making lists and checking them off (So do I!) 6. The birth father is believed to be an athlete. A pro baseball player. Seals the deal that baby boy will be an athlete of some kind 7. I don't know if birth father knew she was pregnant or that the baby was born. She didn't say much about him. I kno...

This week has truly been a whirlwind! Last Friday, when we chilled together in our loft, we had no idea that our world was about to be turned upside down in the best possible way. Today was the day we became baby boy's legal guardians. I am a mom. Rodney is a dad. Holy crappppp! We got a call a few hours before we were scheduled to be at the hospital for all of the legal document signing. Our caseworker shared that baby boy had been moved to NICU due to withdrawal, irritability and not eating as much as he should be. In addition, he had been holding his own and not requiring medication - but that ended today. Not only did he get a tube put in for feeding, but they also started him on morphine to ween him off of the withdrawal. I decided immediately that I would stay overnight with him to spend extra time and ensure we started to create a bond.  I was an emotional basket case all day. Literally everything was making me cry. My poor husband would look over, wonder what happened and t...