Bringing Home Baby

Sweet baby Judah Paul came home with his family last night (Thank you, Father!!) We three are so enchanted by him.

I have moments where I just weep...especially when I look at his feet.  The feet that just days ago took up residence under my right rib cage. Tears of gratitude. Tears of joy. Tears because I cannot capture the Love and freeze the moments that make up this beautiful journey. The postpartum hormones don't make me depressed...just ULTRA emotional. 

Daddy was so proud to place his rock outfit he bought for JudahMan on to bring him home.
Big Sister LOVES her brother. She narrates the world for him . Tonight as we pulled into the parking lot she reached over, grabbed his hand, and shouted, "Baby brother, we're at Erma's! You will LOVE Erma's".
She likes to hold him...but on her own. We're still working on that!
Aron's parents were able to make a quick trip up to see the newest addition and help out with Belle as we stayed longer than anticipated in the hospital.
To catch you up...

At some point during delivery, my blood and Judah's blood mixed. Because we have two different blood types, there was an abo incompatability issue which caused antibodies in my blood to attack Judah's healthy blood cells. When this happens, the blood cells burst. Normally, the liver would clear these dead blood cells, but newborn livers take several days to begin fully functioning, so they aren't fully able to clear the toxin.

This is a fairly common and easily treatable issue...just some time under UV light to help the body transform the bilirubin into a form the body can excrete. So we spent 24 hours under the bililights from Friday morning to Saturday. 

Saturday morning, Judah's levels looked okay, but they needed him to spend 12 hours without the lights to make sure his levels didn't rebound too high. So by  6 pm Saturday night

Judah's Bilirubin level didn't 'rebound' as expected (which I suspect has much to do with the fact that Jackie & I kept him naked in the window all afternoon before his blood draw.) We had to go back to the hospital this morning for another bililevel: this time it rose a little to 11.9

 from 9.7, but the pediatrician said she expected this due to another factor: physiologic jaundice.

Physiologic jaundice is a phenomenon experienced by most breastfed infants as they wait for their livers to begin functioning at an adequate level. It peeks at 3-5 days of age and requires no treatment. So right now, we're just watching Judah to ensure his peek bilirubin levels from physiologic jaundice compounded with the abo incompatability jaundice remains at a safe level. We'll have to do daily blood draws until his levels begin to fall. But should they go to high, we'll have to be readmitted for treatment under the lights again. The next few days are a little touch and go. Please pray for him & us until we're through these waters. Its unnerving knowing we may have to be readmitted, and not being able to just relax and enjoy being home.

Aron has been waiting for weeks for this....relaxing on the couch just holding his son. He is in heaven. In fact, he doesn't share the boy very well!

So another Bili level in the morning...and we're praying for good results. We want to keep our Judah at home with us where he belongs.

ejk