A Long Week

I finally was discharged from the hospital yesterday after a week.  As happy as I thought I was to be going home it certainly was overwhelming to arrive home with an infant.  I am so exhausted right now that I am not even sure that I can write a coherent blog.  lol 

Sunday we got to the mother baby unit around 2am or 3am or something.  Sunday we pretty much hung out in the room with Emma staring at her.  I couldn't believe that this tiny little person had come out of my tummy and even now it seems very surreal that they are one in the same.  I think the phrase "She's so cute" has come out of each of our mouths at least 500 times a day. 

Monday things got a little more intense.  Our student nurse had accidentally pulled the emergency cord changing the sheets on my bed.  We had plans to attend a breastfeeding class at 10:30am so I got up and took a shower (finally), brushed my hair, and even put on some make up.  During my shower I was supposed to remove the bandages over my staples.  Holy heck!  This sh*t hurt!  So, I'm standing in the shower, crying hysterically, and I asked Paul to get a nurse.  Well, our student nurse gets set back to help me.  Picture me standing in the shower, this poor nurse kneeling before me, trying to help pull these bandages off.  It never occurs to me to turn off the shower so she is getting soaking wet.  If it weren't for the foot long row of staples in my still giant, still gross belly then it would've been a scene out of a porno.  haha  Unbeknownst to this nurse her day was to get even more interesting.

After the shower I finally felt like a real human being again until I walked into the room to wait for Paul to put my socks on (he had gone to get me some juice) when my heart started racing to the point that I knew I was having a problem and needed to pull the emergency cord myself.  Thank God Emma was in the bassinet and I wasn't holding her.  The nurse asks over the speaker what is wrong and I can only get out "my heart" and all of the sudden several nurses are rushing into the room.  Paul hears the alarm going off when he's on his way back from the kitchenette and laughs thinking the student nurse had pulled someone else's cord until he realized the lights were flashing outside our room. 

My nurse called over a nurse from L&D to install an IV (I had just gotten my original IV removed a couple hours ago) instead of waiting on the IV response team person to get there.  My heart rate was 212.  The nurse is telling me to take deep breaths, I'm trying to take slow breaths, Paul is comforting Emma, and I'm crying.  Paul sends Emma to the nursery and the hospitalist (what they call their doctors who work at the hospital, but not necessarily in a department I guess) comes in.  He confirms that I am in SVT (ironically I had told every nurse and doctor in L&D about my SVT, but stopped telling people as soon as we got to the mother baby unit) and orders a beta blocker for me while they are trying to figure out if they can use adenosine on the mother baby unit (as they didn't have the necessary equipment up there to monitor my heart).  Someone from cardiology comes up and does an EKG, they give me the beta blocker, and it slows my heart, but not enough. 

A doctor and team of nurses come up from the ICU, they decide they can give me the adenosine, and they bring in the crash cart.  My student nurse is standing there watching all this and I'm sure thinking "OMG they are going to stop this woman's heart."  Not the day she was expected at all.  I just remember her eyes being huge.  haha

My ob is in the hospital (my actual OB--welcome back from vacation!) and they had her paged so she walks in carrying an edible arrangement (my sister had sent it and the volunteer was just about to walk in the room with it).  They gave me the adenosine and my heart rate returns to normal. 

They decided to keep me over night in a telemetry bed and of course there wasn't a private room available so they stick me in the ICU for the night.  I've never been in the ICU before and that was quite the experience.  I lost all dignity as they didn't want me out of bed until they did a CAT scan to rule out a blood clot or pulmonary embolism so I got to use a bed pan for the first time(or several times).  I'm pretty sure those nurses were not used to having to help someone pee so much!  When I was allowed out of bed I was only allowed to use a portable potty in my room.  As I had glass doors and curtains that didn't close all the way modesty was out the...well, glass door as it were.  I was still in so much pain from the c-section that I didn't even care. 

The mother baby unit and the ICU were able to work out a plan to have Emma brought down several times so I could bond with her.  Unfortunately I wasn't able to breastfeed due to the iodine contrast they used in the CAT scan, but at least I got to spend time with her.  The nurses in the ICU loved Emma.  She was quite the celebrity down there (as was I seeing as I was the only patient under the age of 70 as well as the only patient who was conscious) and all the nurses wanted to love on her. 

It was interesting to see how the different doctors felt about the SVT.  Paul ran into my high risk ob and he said it wasn't uncommon for pregnant and post-partum women to have SVT due to their high blood volume.  The cardiologist just said to drink very icy water when I first had symptoms to shock my heart into beating normally (my echo and CAT scan were normal).  The hospitalist and ICU doctor acted like I might die any minute.  I ended up stuck in the ICU for over 24 hours, but it was reassuring to know that they were monitoring my heart (and also that they came in to check on me every 2 hours).  Plus Emma got extra snuggles from the nursery staff upstairs. 

I finally broke free on Tuesday morning and got to return to my sweet baby girl.  She missed her mama!  Paul had to return home as he couldn't stay in the ICU so he spent the nights at home until we got discharged.  Emma and I had quite the sleepless nights although I did utilize the nursery as much as possible at night.  My girl likes to eat so it would seem as I just returned her to the nursery and fallen asleep when they were bringing her back to eat again. 

The food at the hospital was so good that I almost didn't want to leave.  Emma & I are going to do mommy baby yoga there once she's a little older so I def will be eating lunch there those days.  lol 

We got home yesterday afternoon and Emma has already brought so much joy into our lives.  She is the love of our lives.