One year ago today Carter came home from the hospital after a long, grueling 66 day stay in the NICU.  Happy coming home anniversary to my little man.  I love you so much and can’t believe how much you’ve grown since then :)

Since Carter’s birthday almost a month ago there have been several times when I’ve thought about what I was doing “one year ago today.”  He was in the NICU for 66 days.  The longest 66 days of my life.  And every single day I was there with him, pretty much all day long.  I would go home to sleep at night, and sometimes leave during the day to run home and let Trigger out or run errands.  I did go back to work for about a week and a half after my maternity leave was over and before I quit.  So on those days I spent the night by his side.

Super Bowl Sunday is a day that I remember.  Jake and I had gone to Babies R Us earlier in the day (when my frustration with them officially began) to get a few more preemie outfits for Carter.  Their ad said the Carter’s brand clothes were all on sale.  When we got there we noticed that all the Carter’s brand clothes were on sale except for the preemie sizes.  After complaining to the manager, we did end up getting the sales price, but that’s not the point.  The same outfits in Newborn size and up were cheaper and that’s completely ridiculous!  I swore that I was going to write a letter to the company but still haven’t.  I really need to get on that.

We headed to the NICU after that and I used their washer and dryer to wash his new clothes.  We changed Carter into a football outfit so that he could watch the Super Bowl and cheer for the Colts!  I held him for most of the game as he, Jake, and I sat there watching.  Carter’s first Super Bowl and we watched it together.

Carter weighed about 4 lb. on Super Bowl Sunday.  He still ate through a feeding tube every three hours like clockwork.  And he still had a nasal cannula on to help him breathe, which he still stopped doing several times a day.  The road ahead for us at that point was longer than the road we had already traveled, we weren’t even halfway through the journey.

This year, I remember back to that day.  He’s grown up and changed so much since then.  He’s no longer that small, fragile bundle that I held in the NICU last year.  He’s an ornery, energetic, fun, curious little one year old boy who weighs a little over 18 lb.  I am so lucky to be his mom and I love him so much.  Thinking back to those days in the NICU still brings tears to my eyes, and I think it probably always will.  But I also know how lucky we are to have him here with us today as happy and healthy as he is.

 

 

 

I love you little man :)

  

Those nine weeks were the hardest weeks of my life.  It really was a rollercoaster of events and emotions.  However, I always tried to remember how lucky we were.  Other than needing to grow and mature, Carter had nothing wrong with him.  After nine weeks he came home, however it felt like nine years at the time.  During his time there the biggest issue was his brady spells.  His breathing was irregular like all babies, but he would stop breathing for too long and his heartrate would drop.  The requirement was that he had to go five days without having a brady event before he could go home.  That was the last thing we were waiting on, he was regulating his body temperature, gaining weight, and eating well.  It seemed impossible that he’d ever go five days without having an event.  The first time the goal date was set we made it to day three and then he had a very bad event.  I wasn’t there at the time but Jake was and he was pretty scared.  The nurse had to come in and stimulate him to get him to breathe again.  We were hoping it was caused by having a lot going on that day, he had gotten his shots and circumcision.  So a new goal date was set.  At the end of day four when I was getting ready to leave for the night I was so upset.  I was so afraid that he would have an event that night while I was at home and we’d come in the next day and find out he wasn’t coming home like we’d been planning and hoping.  But he made it!  Our little boy was finally coming home.  March 18th, it was a wonderful day :)