cute kids

Luke and cousin Madison

Surgery date

We met with the Orthopedic Doctor. He gave us a surgery date of Sept. 19th. That will be his first one. Luckily he said his wrist was not as stiff as he thought so we can skip the first surgery of expanding the tissue. So on Sept 19th they will go in and attach his wrist to the ulna bone (normally our wrist is connected to the radius) then they will rearrange his muscle and tendons to try to straighten out the wrist. Then 1-3 months late they will move the pointer finder over to make a thumb so he can learn to pick things up. The wrist won't stay straight forever, it will eventually start to turn back in but he of course won't know the difference! Luckily this surgery is an out patient surgery and he will be home the same day, but still really really not looking forward to it. He is doing great with it though, he has discovered can get his fingers in his mouth. Although he prefers his thumb on his right hand. He had a brace made for him to wear at night to stretch the tissue a little more. But by morning it is off and lost in bed. He had an x ray while at the Doctors. It looks so odd to have that bone missing!

4 Months

Luke is 4 months already! Time really does fly by. He had his check up and he is 8 pounds 12 ounces. Some of you may say "he is so tiny" but until you have seen and held a 2 pound 8 ounce baby, you have no idea what small is. We had someone ask " how many weeks is he?" Zach was like " uh, 16" :) My very cute niece was born at 8lbs 8 oz. Luke is doing great. His head control is awesome and he is so smiley all the time. That really throws people off. We can start solids in 2 1/2 weeks! Kayden is so so about Luke but Riley loves him. She always wants to sit by him and she puts her baby next to him and always tell him stuff like " when you get bigger and bigger you can share my toys"

Getting Out

I hate winter because we don't get to leave
the house very often. Especially with Luke. The kids favorite places are Discovery Museum, classic fun center and Boondocks.

bye bye thumb

While Luke was in the hospital we met with genetics and after they did many different tests they said it looked like his missing radius bone was not genetic. It was just a random thing. We were so happy it wasn't anything more serious. So he had is ulna bone and 4 fingers. He had no thumb bone just a flap of skin. The night we brought Luke home he was so cranky. I just didn't understand why. I was so worried we were going to have a very dramatic baby. It was a rough night until about 3 am I had to change his cloths. I saw his thumb skin was twisted and red and swollen! I was terrified. In the morning we took him back to Primarys. The blood flow had been cut off so they decided to just remove the skin. He did great, just cried when they gave him the local anaesthetic. I am actually glad it is gone, now I don't have to be so careful.

Crazy house!

Things were so crazy while Luke was in the hospital. While I was in the hospital I felt great. I thought this was a great c section. A few days after I get home things were not getting better, it seemed they were getting worse. And let me tell you living in a 4 level house after a c section sucks! On Thanksgiving day the pain was so bad I couldn't stand it. We were getting ready to go to Zach's family for dinner and we were about to get on the freeway when we decided to go the the E.R. instead. I was bleeding a lot from my incision and they said it was probably hematoma (a bruise) So the nurse sat in there for what seemed like ever and pressed on my abdomen to get the blood out. Oh man that hurt so bad. So I left there with some pain killers and gauze to stop my bleeding. Then 2 days later on the way to go see Luke I was crying because I was in so much pain I couldn't breath, we went into the E.R. again. I was so upset, the nurse treated me like I was in there for pain killers. After the CT came back showing I had 2 big pockets of infections she was much nicer. I was given a good dose of pain killers I was admitted to the hospital to go on IV anti biotic. I was so sad because it was the kids birthday that weekend. I got released after 3 days. Then it took forever for things to finally close up, my incision kept opening back up. It was a very rough couple of months!

The kids were so excited when Luke finally came home. They were so great with Luke. We were afraid they might get jealous (Riley) but they never did. Nothing changed except they didn't understand why Luke had to use their bathtub! :)

7 Weeks in the NICU

Luke spent 7 long weeks in the NICU at Primary Children's. It is such a wonderful hospital! They even had a kids crew and we were able to drop Kayden and Riley off at the kids play zone for about an hour and the staff would watch them while I was able to be with Luke. That was such a wonderful thing for us, it was the only way I could go be with Luke while Zach was at work. When he got transferred there he was a "very sick baby" That is what the Doctors and nurses said. Of course it was so very very hard to see him so sick and little. He had problems with his hematocrit and platelets (blood problems) Then we spoke with Cardiology and they sat us down to tell us about Luke's heart problems. It was hard to follow but we were told he would have to have surgery. We left the hospital that night crying. During the first 2 weeks Luke was a "sick baby" Then one day he was great! Cardiology talked with us again saying his heart wasn't as bad as they thought, he just has a heart mummer. So that was fantastic news. Then the Doctors called it seemed like once or twice a day saying some kind of good news, " he is off of this or we lowered this" Soon he only had an IV for meds, his feeding tube and oxygen. Then he was off everything but the feeding tube. This was the first of December. They started him on his bottle feedings and it was going extremely well. He was a champ. Then one day he was back on the oxygen and not eating. He became very anemic. And his hematocrit fell again. So for a few weeks everything was at a stand still. It was so tiring going back and forth (long drive) to Primary's then having to spend time with Kayden and Riley to keep their life normal plus having to pump every 3 hours. We finally sat down with the Doctor after they determined there was no medical reason for Luke not eating. We learned how to place a feeding tube and FINALLY the day came to bring him home! January 2nd we arrived at the hospital to take him home. He was 4 pounds 7 ounces. It was a great day!

Very overdue update!

It has been soooooo long since I have updated this blog! I am such a slacker. With Kayden and Riley I always updated the blog. So I am starting now with Luke's birth story, almost 4 months ago! So here it is.

On Monday November 14th I woke up so happy because I had made it to the 33 week milestone! I had an ultrasound at 12 pm. I was so excited to see the baby and finally get a good 3d pic. Zach stayed home with the kids because this was supposed to be a normal check up. As I was laying there I told the tech I wanted a 3d, she hurried through the ultrasound and turned it off and said "have you been leaking any fluid?" You never want to hear that question. She said there is no fluid and not so good blood flow to the placenta. I can't explain the horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. I called Zach while I was waiting barley keeping tears back. The Doctor came in and put his hand on my knee and said " we need to get this baby out now" I started crying! How could this happen again?! He said I was lucky Luke was still alive. He had not grown in 4 weeks, they estimated his weight at 1 pound 15 ounces. I was an emotional wreak, I just cried walking down the hall to labor and delivery. We were so blessed we had family that could make it and help with the kids. Since they knew I would be having a c section they wanted to wait 12 hours but the baby's heart rate kept dropping so at 6 my wonderful Doctor came in and said lets do this. So off we went, this time the spinal hurt like hell! But after just a short time we heart a tiny tiny cry and I asked Zach is it a boy or a girl but half his body was still in me :) finally they pulled him out and Zach cried it was a boy. I started crying. I was so happy I could hear his cry! They cleaned him up and brought him over, he was so small, 2 pounds 8 ounces, I gave him a kiss and they took him away.
It seemed like forever before they would let me get out of bed, I told them I would get up myself if they didn't let me up. It was later the next day that I FINALLY got to see Luke. He was so small and it was so hard to see him. Kayden and Riley were in the NICU but they weren't this small. He was on a ventilator among other lines and cords. We could only very lightly put our hands on him. We weren't actually able to hold him for a week. It was so hard leaving him there when I went home. He had to have blood transfusions and so many different medications it was heart breaking. Only 4 days after he was born I got a call saying there was something wrong with heart and he was going to Primary Children's. So there he spent the next 7 weeks of his life.