I know its been too long since I updated this so I am going to do this in two parts... The first part being about Rebekah and the second part being about everything else. Its going to be lengthy just to warn you.
Rebekah Lynn joined us on March 27th after a pretty hard labor. She tried to give us some excitement. A few days before at our checkup we discovered she was breech. We scheduled a version to manually flip her for Monday. Then I went to work trying everything I could to get her flipped. On Thursday I went to the Chiropractor and got some adjustments to help and that night she was being really active so I “helped” her by nudging and encouraging her to turn. She started turning a bit on her own and when she tried to come back I put my hand there so the only was she had to move was into head down position. It worked and we were VERY excited to avoid the version and/or a cesarean. Then our dr was out of town for the weekend so we were being really lazy just waiting for Monday. I just laid around and took it easy. However she had different ideas and my water broke on Saturday morning. After a long day she was was born at 5:14 pm weighing 6lb 12oz.
The next day we were getting ready to leave the hospital and go home to be together as a family when things went downhill and fast. I had felt awful all night with chills but despite us telling them it didn't seem right they insisted it was normal. I have had the shakes after having babies before but this was different. Since they said it was normal we just figured it would go away and I would feel better in a day or so, so we still planned to go home. However just before we were to leave they were doing our vitals and Rebekah had a fever. All plans to leave were off. They tested her blood and discovered that she had an infection. Less than 24 hours old and the poor child was sick already. She was admitted to the level 2 nursery where she was put on IV antibiotics. We were told she would be there for at least 48 hours. A couple hours later they were checking me and I had spiked a fever as well. Pretty soon I was all hooked up and on IV antibiotics as well. I spent most of the next few days in the nursery holding her as much as possible. I was only on the IV antibiotics for a day then put on oral antibiotics for 10 days. They released me from the hospital the next night and we stayed on as boarders to be near Rebekah. Sheldon was bored out of his mind. He probably should have gone home with Alice and the kids, there was just nothing for him to do. After 48 hours Rebekah's levels were still not down (indicating she still had some infection in her) so they wanted to keep her another day. She stayed one more day. The drs weren't sure what to do because she was otherwise showing no signs of problems just her blood still showed infection. We were told if she had to stay past 72 hours it was standard practice to keep babies for a whole week. So they tested her blood one last time before the 72 hours was up and FINALLY we were cleared. We were allowed to leave the hospital but were asked to stay in town and come in for a check-up in the morning. If things still looked good we could go home. The next morning things looked great and we got to come home.
We were home for maybe 3 days and then the poor child (along with the rest of the family) got a cold. So far she is one month old and she has had 3 healthy days. We did end up taking her to the dr for it after a couple weeks. She just barely managed to stay out of the hospital. If her O2 levels were under 90 they would have admitted her, they were coming in right at 90-91. The dr sent us home with some prednisone. Within a few hours of her first dose we noticed improvement. She still has lingering traces of the cold (as do the rest of us) but seems to be on the mend. Hopefully we can keep her healthy after this.
It would be wrong for me not to mention here how blessed we feel. We felt all along that we should go out of town for this baby. We figured a benefit would be to save some money but we just felt like maybe we should. And how grateful we are. If we would have had Rebekah in Ely, ever with the minor complications we had they would not have been able to treat her adequately and would have probably life flighted her out leaving me in Ely and her in Salt Lake. I am so grateful we were somewhere they could treat us both and we equipped to handle everything.
Here are all the pictures of Rebekah that first week.
After her first bath...All squeaky clean.
Getting ready to go home try #1
In the Level 2 Nursery
Getting ready to go home try #2.
The twins and Keziah were able to briefly meet her in the hospital. David and Nathan had to wait. Keziah was very cute when she first met Rebekah. Grandma Alice brought her in and she just stared at Rebekah and I in the bed. Finally I put Rebekah down on the bed and Alice handed Keziah to me. I held Keziah for just a minute while she stared at the baby and then climbed down from the bed and back into grandma's arms. She seemed very unsure. I was a little worried. A few minutes later Keziah struggled to get out of Grandma's arms and on the chair and onto the bed. She sat in my lap and reached over to scoop up Rebekah in her arms. I helped her and then she gently stroked the top of Rebekah's head. It was very very precious.
Meeting the rest of her family.
Nathan
David
Zephen
McCaul
Keziah
All of them together.
