So at 5:52pm on Thursday, February 6, Caleb Robert Stock was born. He weighed 8lbs, 10oz and was 20.1 inches tall. Because of my bleeding history, they kept us in the labor and delivery room hooked up to Pitocin until almost 10pm. Caleb conveniently decided to be born before the Olympics were on, so once all was settled around 7pm, Tom and I and Caleb were left alone in the labor and delivery room to watch the Olympics. Around 9:30, they came in and gave him a little spongebath, and got us ready for the Mother/Baby floor. I should mention that Caleb had not stopped crying at all from birth until this point. But he had such a cute little newborn cry (unlike either of our girls at birth) that he was so cute and we were still able to watch the olympics. We did try to nurse him, but he would have none of it. So, they wheeled us off to Mother/Baby. Tom and I got the very last room on the floor they said. The whole floor had been remodeled and opened just this week. We had Caleb for a bit and then they took him off to get his assessment done. He had been making noises while sleeping, so they said they were going to get him checked out by the NICU doctor just in case he had fluid in his lungs or something. Then she came back and told us that his blood sugar was really low and he needed to stay in the NICU for the night and they fed him several bottles of formula. So, we didn't see Caleb again until the morning. We tried to sleep between meds, my assessments, and the cramping and pain. In the morning around 8, they brought Caleb back and had me try to nurse him. We had a 30 minute time limit to try to nurse him and give him a bottle. No pressure, right? So, I actually got him to feed for a bit and then we fed him a bottle. They checked his blood sugar again and it was still low, so Caleb had to head back to the NICU. They explained that big babies that grow fast are living in a high-glucose environment and when you cut the umbilical cord, the baby's pancreas doesn't know what's happening, so it starts making a whole bunch of insulin and it has to learn how to regulate. Tom went with Caleb this time to the NICU. They were in there for about 2.5 hours. Tom says they put the IV in (it took three tries). They started with his right hand, but couldn't get it to work. The NICU doctor said that with bigger babies, it's hard to put in an IV because there's more skin in the way and they can tell where the veins are, but it's hard to tell how deep they are. It worked on the left hand, but only long enough to get some blood for some labwork. And then they had to put it in again. Once they had a successful IV, they got a syringe with a dose of glucose. They put it into a machine that slowly pushed the syringe and gave him the dose through the IV. Then they had to wait 30 minutes to do another blood test. His levels were at a reasonable level, so they brought him back to try to eat. He wouldn't nurse in the allotted time, but we gave him his bottle, and then he had to go back to the NICU for a bit again. Around 5, they determined that we were allowed to keep him in our room for the night, but every 3 hours, we had 30 minutes to try to nurse and feed him a bottle and then they would come in and poke his foot and test his levels again. It was a busy, stressful night, but Caleb managed to start nursing in the allotted time (just before I would have had to pump!) and supplemented with a bottle. He kept his levels up and in the morning, they told us he was probably in the clear, but they needed two more good blood sugar scores 12 hours apart and we had to stay until the following morning to get that last score Sunday morning.
During all of this, the girls were able to come visit on Friday. Tom went and got them and brought them over before Caleb might have to go back to the NICU at 5 (which he didn't end up having to stay... but we thought he might). They were so excited. They both wanted to hold him. Sabrina was excited to cuddle with me without a giant belly and she did some dangerous chair surfing on the hospital room's rocking char. Caleb gave the girls some presents. Celia got a tiny little Lego Friends set. Sabrina got some wood lacing cards, and Caleb gave them an art project to do on the airplane for their upcoming trip in March. They counted Caleb's toes. They discovered they could (barely) fit underneath one of the chairs, so they climbed under that for awhile. The nurse even brought them popsicles. By the time cousin Taylor came to pick them up, they had pretty much taken over the room and kept asking her when they were leaving.
On Saturday night, I was discharged and Caleb became the patient for our final night in the hospital. By this point, we were literally the only patients on the floor and the nurses said we could move to one of the big rooms with a king-sized Tempurpedic bed. It was awesome. So, we moved rooms, and Tom and I got to eat our proud parent meal. That means Tom got to pick off the hospital menu for one meal and they gave us champagne glasses with sparkling apple cider and a big chocolate cupcake. Tom and enjoyed our fine meal in our giant comfortable bed and watched the Olympics. It was pretty much the greatest night ever. And though we still had to feed Caleb every three hours, no one came in to bother us, we didn't have a strict time limit, and my milk came in that evening, so Caleb ate until he was full and we didn't have to supplement anymore. In the morning, Caleb passed his final blood sugar level test and we were free to head home.
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