First Week Home

When we got home we introduced the dogs to our daughter. They were skeptical of her and were a little afraid. They had never seen a baby before and it was funny because every time she moved they would jump. They eventually warmed up to her once they got to investigate her a little bit. The cats on the other hand didn't want anything to do with her. Later that evening we got a call from the hospital with the results of her bilirubin test she had gotten that morning. Her results were worse than they were the day before and she was now at the level where she needed phototherapy. Someone from the hospital drove to our house that night and dropped off a biliblanket. Biliblankets are used for phototherapy that helps break down high levels of bilirubin in the bloodstream. It exerts a blue/white light of varying intensity that permeates through a light fabric. The baby is then placed on the blanket during treatment. We were instructed to keep her on it as much as we could over the weekend. I am glad that we could have the biliblanket in our home and that we didn't have to take her back to the hospital but it was hard because we tried to keep her on it as much as possible which prevented us from being able to hold her as much as we would have liked. That night we unpacked and started to get things ready for bed. We had bought a pack 'n play with a bassinet attachment on it to put in our room next to the bed and we had also bought the Owlet monitor to put on her when she slept. The Owlet would alert us if either her heart rate or oxygen level went below a certain level. It was probably the best thing we bought since it gave us peace of mind and was able to let us sleep without worry.  Since we were tired from the night before we wanted to be able to get some sleep that night. Now that I was pumping at home I was starting to save as much as I could and was freezing it in bags. What I was producing at first was mostly colostrum but it was starting to get a lighter yellow color the more I produced. My milk was starting to coming in. Since I was pumping, my husband was able to help out at night and finger feed her with the syringe and feeding tube every other feeding and luckily our daughter was able to go back to sleep after each feeding. We got some better sleep that night but when I woke up that next morning I was in pain. My nipples were all cracked and scabbing and my milk had come in so much that I was starting to get clogged milk ducts in my armpit. The lactation nurse called that morning and instructed me to massage the lump in the shower towards the nipple and when I would nurse her to try and point her nose towards the lump. In the shower I picked the scabs off my nipples with tweezers and tried to massage the lump as much as I could. It was so sensitive that I could hardly put any pressure on it. I had my husband run to the store to get some Lectithin pills to help unclog the ducts and to also help prevent it from happening again. I tried to keep some ice under my armpit to help with the swelling and pain but nothing seemed to help. I kept pumping and nursing and with each nursing session she was getting better at latching. The pain from my nipples was getting better and the cramping from the let downs were also getting better but I still had the sore lumps. That day was a hot day and to our luck the air conditioner broke and the upstairs was unbearably hot. We stayed in the basement for the day were it was cooler but we couldn't get anyone out to fix it until Monday since it was the weekend. So we slept in he basement that night on the couch. I could hardly sleep. We had a few more visitors that came over that weekend and all the while we kept her on the biliblanket as much as possible. We gave her a first bath over the weekend in the kitchen sink and my husband started to feed her out of a bottle at night when he would wake up to feed her instead of the syringe and feeding tube. We had heard that giving a breastfed baby a bottle could cause nipple confusion between bottle and breast which would cause the baby to stop latching on the breast so we bought NUK Simply Natural Baby Bottle. The way the nipple is shaped with these bottles is similar to the way a real nipple is and does not cause nipple confusion which luckily worked for us. On Monday we had her first appointment with her pediatrician and they checked her bilirubin levels again. Her levels were starting to go down and was now low enough that she didn't need the biliblanket, but the pediatrician wanted to make sure that it wouldn't rebound so she had us continue to use it for a couple more days and she wanted to continue to check her levels daily. After our appointment, we went back home and had the heating and air people look at our air conditioner. They fixed what they could but they were going to have to order new parts which would take a whole week to get in. We couldn't go that long without air conditioning so my husband went out and bought a small window unit for our bedroom so we could sleep in our bed. Sleeping in the basement on the couch was not ideal and we couldn't get the best sleep. That next day we went back to the pediatrician office to get her blood drawn again. Her levels were continuing to go down and were getting better and the phototherapy was working. Luckily the clogged ducts in my armpit was going down and I didn't get mastitis. I was starting to feel better about breastfeeding since she was now able to latch correctly and was able to eat properly. It was still a commitment to keep it going and it was a hard adjustment to always be the one feeding her except at night when my husband would help feed her. That next week we had another appointment with the pediatrician and everything was looking good. Her bilirubin levels were normal and she had gained back the weight she lost from leaving the hospital. The air conditioner was fixed and things were starting to go back to normal. The craziness was starting to go away for now and we were able to focus on our daughter and just being a family.