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Friday, May 31, 2013

Isaac Francis Crawford has Arrived!

He's Coming

Memorial weekend is our wedding anniversary. We had a great weekend working on a few home projects and hung out with some friends. I felt tired as usual and I had some Braxton hicks but nothing painful or out of the usual. On Tuesday morning I got up a 1:45 AM to go to the bathroom and got back in bed. At 2:00 AM I felt a big gush and ran to the bathroom and called for Brian. My water had broken and we were only at 35 weeks 5 days! I called my doctor's office and they said to come in so I called my mom and dad to come over and be there for Nathan. I hopped in the shower and packed a little and as soon as my parents got there we headed over to medical city Dallas. My dad stayed with Nathan and my mom came with us.

At Medical City Hospital

The call was from the neonatologist in the NICU who said that all of the ECMO spots are full. This had never happened before at this hospital. They came in to talk to us and said that there's no way to know if he will need ECMO or not, but it isn't a good idea to deliver at a hospital that doesn't have access to it. We knew this and that's why we had chosen Medical City because it was close and was one of the few hospitals in the country that had ECMO. They kept saying it was the "perfect storm" and had never happened before. They needed to move us quickly because I could go into labor at anytime. Once labor starts I wouldn't be able to be transferred. They said the best option was Harris Methodist in Fort Worth because it is connected to Cook's Childrens hospital. But all of the doctors we had met and my OB could not come with us. So all the work we had done was lost, finding the surgeon, touring the NICU, meeting the neonatologists. And I couldn't even deliver with my OB who I trusted and who delivered Nathan and helped us through listing Angie. But we didn't have time to worry about a whole new hospital because I could go into labor at anytime. They started getting ready to put me in an ambulance and transport me a hour away to Fort Worth. Then they said they might have to take out the epidural and redo it there because some anesthesiologists won't work with someone else's epidural. I cried again, this was too much. Thankfully they talked to the doctors at Harris Methodist who said they could keep it in and try it when I got there. Sounded good to me! 

The Surprise

They hooked me up to the baby monitors when I got there and said baby was doing really well. After they hooked up the IV and I started getting some contractions so I decided to go ahead and get the epidural so I could try to rest a little. The epidural is not fun to get, but it's pretty wonderful once it kicks in! So we tried to sleep a few hours. Around 8 the doctor came in and checked me and I was at 2 cm but not having many contractions. They decided to start Pitosin to get labor moving along faster. Once your water breaks, the risk of infection goes up the longer it takes to deliver the baby. The nurse brought in the Pitosin and was about to hook it up to the IV when she got a call. And that's when things got a little crazy. 

The Arrival

They loaded me onto the tiny ambulance gurney and we started the bumpiest, most uncomfortable ride I've ever taken. We arrived, they put me in a nice room, we met the doctors, and filled out all new paperwork. They started the Pitosin and were able to successfully restart the epidural. Whew. I tried to rest while Brian and mom went to lunch. Around 3:30 we met the neonatologist who worked at Harris and would lead the NICU team right after Isaac was born. I had been laying on my right side for a while and they helped me roll over. That is when I had the worst contractions ever. It felt like I didn't even have an epidural. The nurse checked me and said, "oh, you're complete! It's time to deliver!" Isaac arrived at 4:10 PM, let out two little cries, peed on a nurse, and was handed over to the NICU team. They cleaned him up and looked him over and the neonatologist said he looked good, aside from the CDH. They put him in the transport isolate and wheeled him over to me so I could say hi, then they rushed him through the hospital and skybridge with Brian to Cook's. 

In The NICU

They worked on getting him stable and around 9:00 PM I was able to go see him. You can look at a lot of pictures, but to actually see your tiny baby hooked up to so many machines is terrifying. I sat with him and sang to him for a while.  He weighed 6 lbs 6 oz and was 19.7 inches  long.  His first APGAR was 7 and the second was 8.   Brian went home to check on Nathan and I went back over to Harris for the night.

The next day he started having a lot of arrythmias and they couldn't figure out why. They did several echoes and his heart is structurally normal, but it might have a electrical problem. It was really scary for a while because his heart rate was all over the place and there were a ton of people in the room.  Dr. Lawrence has been Isaac's doctor; he's been really nice and informative.  Dr. Lawrence and the cardiologist finally found a drug that helped and he settled down again. Then that night he started having the same problem again and they threatened to put him on ECMO. They tried a new drug and that worked really well. On Thursday, they just let him recover and relax and have been able to ween him off of a lot of oxygen. Today they tried the PICC line again but weren't able to get it threaded just right. He really needs this line to get the meds to his heart. The good news is that he tolerated it well. When they tried it on Wednesday, his stats kept dropping, but today he held steady. We hope to meet with the surgeon today and talk about the surgery to fix the hernia. 


I'm still shocked that my water broke early and sad we are so far from home. But I really think he is at a better hospital. Medical city did less than 10 CDH cases a year, but Cooks does 18-24 a year and a lot more ECMO experience. We are still figuring out the logistics of everything but very thankful he is in good hands and doing well so far.  Thank you all for following our journey and for all the thoughts and prayers.  If you are just now following along and are confused by all the terms we use, please check out the CDH FAQ page.  


2 comments:

  1. He is doing very well and avoiding ECMO so far proves that! Keep it up Amazing Isaac! It isn't unusual for these babies to have arrhythmia of the heart. Their systems are jumbled. Remember that slow and steady win this race and usually when things happen that were not in the plans, it was meant to be! Keeping you all in my thoughts and prayers!

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  2. Congratulations on avoiding ECMO for the time being. It sounds like you had quite the wild ride even getting to delivery! I'm glad you seem to feel like you're in capable hands.
    After our water broke Monday at 35w2d, our CDH daughter was delivered Wednesday afternoon. I can't believe how close they were in gestational age, that both of us had our water break, and that Isaac ended up being born less than 24 hours before our Clarity. I'll be anxious to follow your journey here. I'm documenting our story at http://www.moderncrafter.com.

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