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FYI: Click on any of the pictures on this site to see a bigger version (although Christopher will probably still look small in all of them).
Christopher finally getting held by his Mommy for the first time, 6 days after he decided to come out to the party early.
With a reaction common to many children that Andy holds, Christopher filled his diaper as soon as he was in his Daddy's arms. We think Christopher likes his Daddy. 
This one's for you, Dad. We call this "Christopher's Lunchbox," because it's the cooler that we use to carry the bottles of breastmilk to the hospital in. We tell him that it was Grandpa's lunchbox long before it was his.
Yes, we got to finally hold our little boy at around noon today. It was a wonderful moment and we didn't want to ever put him back. His entire body, from butt to his neck, fits into one of my hands. The doctors took the arterial line out of his foot, and with that and his chest tube gone, we should be able to hold him at least once a day for an hour. This is precious time, as we want to try and connect with him as much as we can during the couple of hours we get to see him a day. With Rachel, the nurses just plopped Christopher down under Rachel's shirt. When I asked them if I needed to take my shirt off, one nurse laughed really hard and the other one passed out. I guess they thought it was really funny that I'd be warm enough for him with my shirt on. Weird.
They've increased his food intake to 12ccs every 3 hours, and it's fun to be able to feed him. He's gained 2 "legitimate" ounces (read: not poop or pee) so he's up to 2lbs 9oz. He really doesn't feel like you're holding very much. The doctors said that his right lung (the holy one) looks better than his left lung, because when it healed itself it also got rid of a bunch of junk in it. The left one is still weak, but the excellent staff is monitoring it closely.
Please pray for Rachel's mom, as she is driving back home (Johnson City, TN) today. Her presence will be missed...she's been such a wonderful help. My mom and stepdad are heading down for the weekend, so we'll still have grandparental presence. Rachel is at school for a full 12 hours today, and she stopped taking her pain medication yesterday, so please pray for her. She's being so strong when she can, and it just makes me so proud of her.
I don't think I've ever looked forward to spending a weekend at the hospital before, but I am today.
Whew, what a day. We had a great visit with Christopher; the doctors have removed his "Cake safe" and put him back on the nasal oxygen. It's another nice step forward, but it irritates his little nose so I hope it comes out soon. The threat to his left lung is quickly abating, so much so that they doctors removed his chest tube this morning! Man, little kids sure do heal and or go into crisis faster than I'm used to!
Christopher lost all of the weight he gained yesterday, which I found out is because he wasn't peeing. When he finally did, he lost almost 3.5 oz! Again, back to my quick math example, I guess that's equivalent to a 200lb man losing ~6 pounds of urine in a single day (about 3/4 of a gallon)! I have a feeling that story will come back to him at a later time.
We got to feed him today through a syringe into a tube in his stomach, which was another cool moment. He was very active today and tolerated us holding his hands, feet, and even my corny dad jokes. It's nice to be able to touch him and take care of him a little bit more.
Ann told me tonight how happy she was that we were telling people what we need. It's a hard thing to do, but I guess that no one can do anything to help unless they know what we need. People can't read our minds.
I think that being a Dad has finally started to catch up with me. Last night, we had a pretty bad storm, and I couldn't sleep for half the night because I kept worrying that Christopher might get scared and I couldn't be there to help him. In my head, I knew that he was in a brick building, in an inner room, in a plastic box, and surrounded by machines, and he wouldn't hear a thing. In my heart, I just felt horrible that I couldn't be with my son. I've never had a thought or fear like that before.
Nights are definitely the hardest for us. When all of the buzz of the day dies down and it's just us, it's really hard to lay in bed and think about not being able to hold your child and to have him so far away. It's truly amazing how much love God puts in your heart for a baby that you don't really even know...it's stronger than any love I feel for anyone but Rachel, and I've only known Christopher a few days =).
I think the better that he does, the harder it will be to leave him in the hospital.
Christopher getting fed by Mommy for the very first time. Yeah, it looks like a science experiment, but Rachel is feeding him breastmilk through the syringe into a tube in his stomach. Yum! The pacifier he has is the smallest one available!
A precious moment. Christopher is holding Mommy's finger in his right hand and Daddy's in his left. His poor little nose gets swollen and irritated from the dry oxygen going in, but it does help him breathe.
You've asked for it, and now it's finally here. Here's a list of things that we either need or would like because they would make our lives much easier.
1. Prayer. That's the whole reason that Christopher is doing so well.
2. Gas cards/gas money to help us with all of the commutes (1-1.5 hour round trip to the hospital, and we make multiple trips per day)
3. Gift cards to restaurants around the Richmond Road, St. Joe East area so we can eat dinner or lunch between visits without going home or eating at the crampeteria
4. Diapers, preemie, newborn, or any size. We'll need them all and can exchange them for the right size if we have too many of one or the other
5. Dinners that can be frozen or reheated for when we may need them. It might be hard to coordinate people bringing over hot meals since our schedule will be so sporadic and we'll be spending so much time at the hospital.
6. People have expressed interest in mowing and cleaning. This would be great at some point because it would allow us to spend more time with Christopher. Our families did that this weekend, so if you're interested in that, call our contact person (see the end of this post) to leave your name. We'll call you if we need you.
7. If anyone has a small chest freezer that they aren't attached to, it would be great to have to hold all of this breastmilk and other meals that we're accumulating.
8. Any other regular baby things that people would like to help out with are on our registries at Babies 'r Us and Target.
Finally, we have a good friend that has volunteered to be our central point of contact for organizing food and other stuff getting to us, so that we can concentrate on other things. Her name is Ann Griesner, and you can contact her via email (I don't want to post her phone number all over the internet) at:
agreisner@alltel.net
You can also click the link on the right of this page. Of course, you are still welcome to call or email me for our address or anything else, but Ann is more organized and very entertaining. Thank you all so much for everything. We feel so loved and supported and your prayers and concern really, truly help. I hope that we have a chance to one day give back a tenth of the love that we have received already.
Just a quick update before I run out the door again. I visited Christopher this afternoon at about 4, and he's having a great day! They took him off of the CPAP and put him under an oxygen hood (pic to come later) where he's doing a lot better. Most of the swelling is gone from his face, and he's starting to look more of the part of the good-looking guy we all know that he'll be. His supplemental oxygen has been reduced to about 34% (we breathe about 21%) and he's doing all his breathing by himself. His right lung appears to be healing, but his left lung has some weak spots in it, so the Hospital is taking preventative measures (read: putting him on his side) to hopefully stop a rupture before it happens. The chest tube is still in, but not being used right now, which is a good thing.
All of the nurses call him "fiesty," because he always puts up a big fight whenever they try to give him medicine or anything. What a guy! And for some other good news, he started eating again through a tube that goes into his stomach and he's doing fine. He's even gained 3 oz!!! Doing some quick math, that's the same thing as a 200lb man gaining 6 pounds in 18 hours.
I know we'll continue to have ups and downs, but I'm very thankful for the ups today. When I visited him, he opened his eyes and looked around...it was the first time I've seen his deep blue eyes and I just stood there and cried. What a miracle.
I promise I'll post the list of things we need, as well as the person to call/email to coordinate everything by tomorrow morning. Thanks so much!!
Love to all.
Update: Here's some pics!
Christopher yesterday (9/26) on a ventilator and under Billy lights for Jaundice
Tonight (9/27) under his "cake safe" oxygen tent. And yeah, if anyone has seen any of my baby pictures, this bears SCARY resemblance to how I looked as a newborn. The little dude has his eyes open!! He now responds to our voices!
Hello world! This blog is being setup so everyone can keep track of updates on Christopher and on our family. Like so many things, I (Andy) was planning on taking lots of time to set this up and making it perfect before our baby came. And, like with so many other things, we're making due with the time we have. =)
Christopher had a rough morning today. He started coughing at about 5:30 and did so hard enough to rupture one of his lungs. This gave him air in his chest cavity, which made it hard for him to breathe. The doctors put a chest tube in and are leaving it in to suck the air out, which is making things much more comfortable for him. Here's how I look at it: Christopher's muscles are so strong that his lungs couldn't keep up for now. But they will.
He started drinking breast milk earlier today, but they had to cut him off after the lung incident. They should be starting him back on food by now, which is good news. We need this boy to fatten up (I'm going to give him a complex, I'm sure)!
Rachel is doing well, although time at home without our baby is continuing to be difficult. She's healing physically very quickly, and may even be able to finish part of her last semester of nursing school. We're grateful for the help that Rachel's mom has been giving us by staying with us this week...it really makes things easier.
We have been blessed with so many amazing people in our lives that want to do so much to help us. We're working on putting together a list that we'll have up here and send an email of things that would be nice to have to help us through these next weeks of constant commuting. Stay tuned.
I went back to work today and was really blessed to find out that my coworkers have literally done my job for me for the rest of this week. What a great bunch of people! Please visit this site often, we'll try to update it daily. And again, thank you to everyone for your wonderful support! You are all making the difference between this being unbearable versus something that we shoulder together. We are so blessed!
