A Chronicle of Experience Begins
So much has happened in my life in the past month or so. I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl on the 3rd, Alice Loreea McNay. She weighed in at 7lbs 15 oz, and 21 inches long, she had a head full of hair and lungs like her mamas. She also had a few little surprises for us that turned my whole world upside down (again, because she did that when she was born). We stayed in Blessing Hospital from Friday until Sunday, and had a follow up appointment with her pediatrician on Tuesday because she was a little jaundice. Tuesday rolls around and we go, have the blood drawn, and when the results come back we get a call, they want to take an ultrasound of her liver and do some more blood tests. So we had the ultrasound on Tuesday evening and the blood work done first thing Wednesday morning. Three hours later, we got another call, we needed to go to St. Louis Children’s Hospital to see a specialist. As you can imagine, I as a new mom, am so scared that I can barely think.
We spent the first week at St. Louis Children’s meeting what seemed like hundreds of doctors (it was actually around 20 all told) and watching as they poked, drew blood, spinal fluid, took mris and ultrasounds to find out what was wrong with our little girl. Finally, we got an answer, she had two blood infections, one Group B Strep she got during birth and the other CMV she contracted in the womb. We spent the next 14 days dealing with IV problems and picc lines while she received her treatment before we were discharged on the 23rd of December, two days before Christmas and she was only 20 days old. Let me tell you, that feels like years when you are in the hospital with your child.
We’ve been home for just over a week now. After several delays we got her medications at the pharmacy and she is doing fine. :) We got to spend Christmas at home with our little angel :) That’s the silver lining. We have a long road ahead of us, but it is a road with hope. I can’t begin to tell you how lucky we were that our doctor ordered the tests she did and caught the things she caught. It has had a profound effect on me.
The rest of my life will never be the same as it was, and every precious minute is one I will cherish even as the ones the drive me to the limit of my patience and knowledge.
She is worth it all:
