Setbacks SUCK
If I could write the word SUCK bigger in the title of this post, I would.
I was at the hospital last night for the boys’ 11 pm and 12 am feeds. Nate was sleepy, but he took 30 cc by breast and the rest by bottle. While I was feeding Ace, Nate started to desat a little bit, which means his blood oxygen level was dropping below 90.
The nurse — a nurse they’ve had for the first time, as far as I know — was watching him. She said he was doing it earlier, and she was going to give him until midnight to see what he was going to do. It was 12:30 am at this point, so she seemed concerned.
I mentioned that his nose was congested and he was sort of slouched in his positioning, which could be cause for the desats. But she reached for the oxygen and put a mask on him. As soon as she did that, I knew we lost our ticket home.
He came back up and the nurse was happy. Then she went to talk to the pediatrician. I heard her saying she wanted to put his NG tube back in and my heart sank. However, the doctor said they had just increased his feeds, and the first step should be to drop the feeds back down and see if that helps him.
I went home for the night and walked in my front door at 2 am. I slept for a few hours and then started pumping. I called Skip to let him know what was going on, and then I called the Special Care Nursery to see what had gone on through the night.
Today’s nurse said they put the NG tube back in and he took a feed that way and did fine. I asked what happened when they dropped the feeds, and she said they never did that, which upsets me. That was the doctor’s recommendation, so why did the nurse put the damned tube back in before dropping the feeds? I am going to ask about that today.
Today’s nurse said that he had lost a little weight, but I would think it would stand to reason that if the higher feed amount made him work too hard, he’d lose some weight, and perhaps the lower feed that required less energy would have allowed him to continue to gain.
At any rate, we’re back in limbo, and I am feeling really discouraged.
