Matthew has had surgery

Yesterday Matthew had surgery. We showed up at the hospital at about 9am and we were not sure if they were going to do surgery or not. They had to make sure that he could handle lying on his right side. (that is his big lung and "good" side) He tolerated it very well. So at about 10:30 the took him in for surgery. They started at about 11:30 and finished at about 5:30. He was a trooper through the whole thing. The nurse called us about every 1/2 hour with updates. He did really well and is still doing good. The incision is only about 2in wide. They made the incision on his left side under his arm pit area. It will heal and not even be noticeable in the future.

We have one more hurdle we have jumped, but we are still a long way from being in the clear. We have NO idea when he will be able to go home it is a one day at a time situation. The Dr's don't even try to guess or even give a timeline. They say they work in a very short time frame. (day to day) So everyday that is a good day is one day closer to getting him healthy and home.

I will keep you updated as I know more.

Love,
Jaime

Peanut has arrived

Peanut has arrived...Well now known as Matthew James. Our precious little miracle baby. He was born October, 25th 2011 at 2:46am. He was 19 1/4 inches long and weighed 6lbs 11oz. As soon as he arrived they cut the cord and handed him off to the NICU team. They worked on him for about 10 minutes to get him intubated and then off to the NICU they went. Jim got to go along with them. 

He is doing really with all things considered. He was given 100% oxygen right away and by 6:30am he was down to 30%. So he is doing really good for that. They will just keep monitoring him and lowing the O2 levels until they can get him to breathing on hos own for awhile. The surgeon will be in today sometime to check him out then they will just evaluate him for a couple days to determine when surgery can be done.

We have jumped over the first huge hurdle and now we have several more to jump, but I have faith that he will do great. We just ask for continued thoughts and prayers and I will keep you all posted.

Love, 

Jaime, Jim, Finn, and Matthew

The "official" delivery date has been set

Today I started my weekly Doctor visits so they can monitor the baby and make sure everything looks good. They normally would do non-stress tests, but they are doing something different with me. They have only told me three different times what it is called, but i can't seem to remember what they say. So what they are doing is basically an ultrasound. They are just checking the heart and other things to make sure they stay "normal". As long as everything stays looking good, then they will induce me on October 24th in the evening or the morning of the 25th. So needless to say I only have about 5 1/2 weeks left. It is getting down to the wire now. It is exciting and scary at the same time. I can't wait to finally meet peanut in person. 

Not sure how many more post there will be before peanut is born. I will post if I find anything else out. It might not be until after peanut is born and then there will be lots of updates I am sure.

The hardest decision we have ever had to make

Ok, so we have made what is probably the hardest decision we have ever had to make. We talked to Neonatologists, Pediatric Surgeons, Perineonatoligists, and multiple others. After talking to each of them, it just led to more confusion. So we just sat down and wrote a list of pros and cons of delivering at each place. That didn't really help either, then yesterday, the Surgeon personally called me to follow up with us. He just wanted to let me know he had talked to the Neonatologist and they had set up a plan to go to Portland and hone up on the lastest procedures for CDH. He told me that no matter our decision they were going to go to Portland anyways. After that phone call I feel that we had a lot of questions answered. So after talking to Jim, we decided to put our trust in the Doctors here in Boise. I had an uneasy feeling the whole time, just thinking of having to go to SFO. My mind has been put to ease for the time being. So this is a decision that we are going to make and stick to. Now we just need to ask for prayers for the doctors at this point and time. I am confident that they can do the necessary procedures. Now we just get to stay here and wait for little peanut to arrive. I am now 30 weeks, so it is getting closer everyday.

Lets hope that I don't have too much more information or any other excitement until I go into labor. I will keep you all up to date if anything else comes up.

Love to all,

Jaime

And the decision just got harder

As you all know we thought that we had it all figured out where to deliver. Then of course we had to have a curve ball thrown at us. Anyways we went and met with one of the Pediatric Surgeons here in Boise yesterday. He provided us some good information, then also confused us a bit more. So with everything he said we need to get into contact with the noenatologist again and talk to him. After we talk to him, then we might be able to make a decision on what we feel is the BEST choice that we can possibly make.

The surgeon basically told us that he is willing to do the surgery as long as he can get 100% commitment from one specific Neonatologist and and team in place to follow us through the rest of my pregnancy. He said as long as he can get that then he would be comfortable with doing the surgery here in Boise. He has done several of these specific surgeries. He has been practicing for over 20 years and knows quite a bit about CDH. On another note the surgeon is not the one that will be giving your baby the most care. It is the Neonatologist, so they are really the ones we want to feel the most comfortable with. So I guess now we just wait to see when we can talk with the Neonatologist again and go from there. I know we still have a "little" time, but we are starting to get closer so we need to make a decision and stick with it.

That is all I know at this point and time. I just pray that we get the answers we need and we can make the best decision possible soon.

Jaime

The confusion continues

The confusion continues... We went in for our monthly ultrasound with the Perineonatologist here in Boise. It came up in conversation that we were planning on going to SF to deliver the baby. She looked at us and asked what made us decide that we didn't want to deliver here in Boise. Both of our jaws dropped in shock. Since when was this even an option? We asked her what she was talking about and she said that we could more then likely deliver here in Boise just as easily as SF. So we talked a little more and she suggested that we meet with a Neonatologist. We went right over the the hospitals NICU and met with him. He gave us a tour of the NICU and then took us to a conference room to talk about his experience with CDH babies. He said that they have had quite a few CDH babies in the NICU in the 20 years that he has been here in Boise. He said that in the last couple they have not had any, but prior to that the had a year they had about 15 babies born in about an 8 month span that had CDH. So they are experienced with them. He had a lot of confidence in his staff and the surgeons here in Boise. (which is always a good thing) That is not enough for us at this point though.

So on Monday this coming week we will meet with on of the pediatric surgeons her in Boise. He said he will sit down with us and give us all the stats of the outcome of babies born here, babies born nation wide at other hospitals and also what he would do if it was his wife going through this. After talking to him on the phone I think that no matter what after the meeting with him on Monday we will fell a lot better about our decision we make. I think if a surgeon tells you what they would do it couldn't be all bad right?

I just hope that we are open enough to hear everything we need to and not what we want to, just to stay in Boise. Of course that would be the ideal situation, but we have to keep in mind this is not about us. It is about what is BEST for our baby. I just pray that we are able to make the right decision and feel very confident in that decision.

I will let you all know how Monday goes.

Love,

Jaime

Baby Peanut Prinzing