Terrified new mum sitting in postnatal ward with baby in neonatal care.

[Charingcrossbun]

Just need a hug!
Warning though - scary birth story.
Had baby at 0624 this morning - after "good" birth in pool but baby's heart beat started to drop so they whipped me out and pushed him out in stirrups with a million midwives helping. Cord was 3 times around his neck and he was pale and floppy. Staff were awesome and are being really positive, he was with a Dr in minutes and then into specialised care - breathing on own,
heart beat good, sucking reflex, normal sleep waking brain activity - but I had a retained placenta
so have just come out of theatre (all removed and sorted) and have to wait until I can get in a wheelchair (spinal block) before I can see him again! DP has seen him obv and Drs have been giving me updates but that doesn't make this less scary!
Despite everything looking positive it was clear that baby was stressed during birth and swallowed Miconium as well as having less oxygen than is ideal - they describe him as grizzly- so they are going to cool him over the next 3 days to prevent brain damage....
I'm just siting her in a bed eating the lunch provided doing nothing...... Feels awful!

[callamia]

2lbs is epic! Congratulations on getting home.
Hope it's going well

[educatingarti]

Glad you are both at home!

[Charingcrossbun]

Thanks guys - nice to hear from you count!!
Edward and I are very good. We came home on Mother's Day which was ace!. Just had his 9day weigh in and he's put on 2lbs and peed all over the midwife so all good

[educatingarti]

Yay! Well done Edward! Hope everything is still improving!

[CountBapula]

Glad he's doing well, charing - how scary for you. (Count here from the 'argh - induction' thread.) Congratulations and best wishes to you all

[Bankholidaybaby]

How are things today, charing?

[Wheresmysocks]

Congratulations on your lovely little boy.

Glad things are improving for you both.

Take care & enjoy!

[Charingcrossbun]

Thank you bankholiday.
Edward was full term and 11days but clearly a dare devil as he decided to wear his cord wrapped around his neck 3 times. Everyone in the nicu has been amazing and the genuine little acts of kindness (smiles, hugs, extra biscuits with a cup of tea) have really restored my faith in humanity!
Edward has done really well and even moved into a room with me. The doctors have a few more tests but they are optimistic we will take him home this weekend.
I know I am really lucky - the work done by charities such as bliss is amazing.

[splasheeny]

Congratulations on your baby. I didn't want to read and run, I hope all works out for you.

[ThePequod]

Congratulations OP! And may I second ILickPicnMix's advice to rest while you are in hospital. Lie on the bed all day (apart from being summoned to feed your lovely baby of course!) and enjoy having your feet up. You're doing such a fab job for your son.

[callamia]

You hero!
That he's bf on demand already is magnificent. How brilliant for you both. You'll be out in no time.

[VegasIsBest]

So glad to hear things are improving. It must be such a relief to be able to feed him and cuddle him.
You may find that your hormones turn you into a quivering jelly any day now. Just remember this happens to many mums and it isn't your situation causing it.

Hope your son goes from strength to strength and you are able to go home together soon.

[Charingcrossbun]

Thank you mintchoc!! And everyone your advice was really helpful. A scary few days where Mumsnet live and the wonderful staff here have been awesome!
He is doing really well still and is now breast feeding on demand!! - which is no mean feat when you're not in a ward with them. Makes me feel very important being summoned to walk the corridors to go feed my son!

[MintChocAddict]

Glad to hear it's all so positive charingcrossbun and nice to hear you've a bit of space from the postnatal ward full of babies. I was in a shared ward of 4, and 3 of us had babies downstairs so made it a bit easier to be apart from DC.
If the midwives can show you how to tube feed him your expressed milk then IMO that's a good thing too. It gave me back a feeling of being slightly in control of the situation and less like everyone else was delivering the care IYSWIM.
All sounds very positive though and hopefully not long before you have him all to yourself.

[stepmooster]

Charingcrossbun I hope you and your little man feel better soon. When my DS was being tube fed, they showed me how to do it. With DD, who was my first born I was quite poorly myself, so they did it all for me. With both they used to feed them what I expressed via a tube, with formula top ups. They gave me an electric pump and lots of bottles, and would wake me up every 3 hours so I could express for them.

It is one of the most frightening things watching your little baby in SCBU. With DS I knew he was going to get better when he started to pull out his feeding tube, the monkey. I think that was the first time I laughed since he was born when he started doing that.

[callamia]

Great news. I hope he continues to get strong and you'll soon be on your way. Hope you are feeling as well as you can, and getting plenty of rest and food. Hopefully you'll soon be able to give that colostrum - I think we were allowed to pop that in the tube on day 2.

Do also get some help with breastfeeding when you and him are ready (if you want to do that), it was a little bit tougher for us to start at day five, but it's entirely possible with some support.

[Charingcrossbun]

Thank you all. Have been to see my little man and everyone is saying positive things. They have stopped cooling him now because all his tests have been so positive.
Have expressed some colostrum for him (although he is still being tube fed at moment). Interesting DP having been heroic yesterday with considerable blood and gore found he was unable to watch me express as it was "all too much". Arn't men weird?
They have also moved me to an antenatal wars which is very kind so I'm not surround by babies and have even indulged in a wee bit of smug pride that labour is behind me!

[Sneezecakesmum]

Coming from the angle of a truly disastrous birth which I'm not going into here, I can reassure you that the long term outcome looks very good for your baby. The things you are saying, breathing for himself, cooling and so on have excellent outcomes normally. Although it's terrifying to see a baby resuscitated please be reassured that newborns are designed to be resilient to some lack of oxygen at birth and it is mostly severe and sustained hypoxia which causes damage.

I've researched this at length and I am sure that within a week you will all be home safe and sound with a healthy newborn.

[LittleMachine]

Congratulations Charing, I hope you get some cuddles soon.

Thinking of you

[callamia]

I'm sorry that you're going through this. Something similar happened to us; I had the giant of nicu - overdue, large and on oxygen to dry out his wet lungs. He's almost six months now, and currently shouting at me/sucking my knee.

Do ask for help with expressing if you can. It will give you something useful to do (I spent a lot of time trying to squeeze out minuscule amounts of colostrum). Also take some time out to rest. It feels counter-intuitive, but while your baby is receiving such good care, you have chance to rest a little. The demands on you will be different, but no less exhausting.

It is all scary, but you're both being well cared for. I hope the next few days go well, and please come back if you need a hand hold in the night - I'll more than likely be up feeding... Look after yourself x

[beela]

My DS was not breathing when he was born, and didn't for 10 minutes. He was transferred to another hospital and cooled for 3 days too. It was a long 3 days, but he is now 3 years old and totally fine. Babies are amazing.

Good idea to give yourselves a bit of time. Make sure you look after each other and I hope the next few days go well.

Oh, and I bet your boy is beautiful, congratulations

[Charingcrossbun]

Thank you! Taking a photo is a good idea - I'll hopefully be able to go down in an hour and do that. I asked
About breast feeding and they said as he is on a drip and antibiotics he can't yet but I can store it for him so will look to work that out too... Feel more positive having things to do.
DP and I have also made the decision to turn our phones off until tomorrow and so not worry about informing anyone (I am meant to be induced tomorrow so family will be expecting a call then). I'm really worried about him too -
He was amazing all
Through birth and of
Course far more aware of everything than me. At the time I couldn't believe he didn't check to see if it was a boy or girl but I now realise he was watching the midwife give resus breaths - very very scary.