The Fam

Starting Tuesday, I go back to work. The first week I’m back I only work half days. When I arranged this plan with my boss of one full week off and one week of half time, it seemed like a good compromise. Now, I’m not so sure.

I don’t want to go back. I’ve gotten very used to being able to see and hold the little man whenever I feel like it. Sure, the first couple of days home all I could think about was getting back to work, but now that the initial culture shock has worn off, I think I like being around the little guy.

Everybody told me that I was very lucky to get almost two weeks off for the birth of my son. I want more. The Mom gets six weeks of maternity leave. Where’s my paternity leave?

According to this article, 45 other countries in the world ensure that fathers get some kind of paternity leave. Where’s mine? Sure, under the Family Medical Leave Act, I’m eligible for 12 weeks of leave when my child is born. The catch? The 12 weeks are unpaid, and only companies with 50 or more employees are required to comply. I don’t think my company is large enough, and we couldn’t afford to lose that much income anyway.

Are we still so career-driven as a society that men are afraid for their jobs if they take time off? Yes, my job is important, but it’s not something that can’t be delegated and lightly managed from home. I’m not worried about someone stepping in and stealing my limelight because I’ve already established myself.

I don’t know what the answer is. I just know I want more time with my kid.

I’ve added a couple of new features to the site. Both show up in the right hand sidebar. (Over there ->)

First is a link to a new feature: the Zayne Picture of the Day. I’ll do my best to actually get a new picture up every day.

Underneath the link is a little item that says how old Zayne is. No practical use, but it’s cute.

Remember that this is an interactive site! Feel free to leave comments on stories and let me know what you think of things.

The little guy’s a bit yellow lately. This is apparently quite normal for boys and preemies. It’s caused by an excess of red blood cells in the system that break down. The parts, called bilirubin, are then processed by the liver into bile. In jaundice, the liver usually can’t process the bilirubin fast enough, and the infant may have an excessive number of red blood cells anyway.

Treatment of jaundice is usually with UV lights. Apparently the UV rays do something, but I haven’t been able to figure out what yet. All of the information I’ve found treats is like a “then magic happens” phenomena, but I’m a science geek and want to know more.

Anybody care to enlighten me?

Zayne Louis arrived at 12:57 AM on Friday, the 20th of May. He weighed 6 pounds 4 ounces, and was 18 1/2 inches long.

The birth itself was rather tense for The Mom and I. When Zayne crowned and began to come out, he had a loop of cord around his neck, and the doctor began to get excited, saying that we were “abrupting”. After he was delivered, he was placed on Mom’s chest for only a moment before he was whisked to the corner where several nurses began to work on him at once. At this point, he was deathly grey, and hadn’t moved or breathed on his own yet. He began to get some color after some vigorous massaging, and was given oxygen. I think that may have been the point when I finally remembered to breathe.

Zayne was moved to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) almost immediately. I got to follow and watch while they hooked him to seemingly every piece of equipment available, plus a few brought in for good measure. It turned out that it was a good thing that he hadn’t taken a breath during delivery, as the abruption caused extra bleeding that would have harmed his lungs if he’d taken it in. In the end, all Zayne really needed was a device called CPAP. This device is used primarily for people that have sleep apnea. It basically provides a little bit of positive pressure to make taking in a breath easier.

If you look at the pictures (link on the right), you’ll see that Zayne had way more than just the CPAP hanging off his little body. Almost everything else is just to monitor his condition - he was never really in need of “intensive” care. The CPAP made it impossible for him to feed normally, so an IV was used to keep his blood sugar up. It looks worse than it was, but to The Mom and I, it looked horrible.

Over the course of the next couple of days, Zayne was weaned off of the CPAP onto a low setting of oxygen. Once this happened, he could start feeding normally. Every time he ate well, they turned down his IV until they were able to remove it completely. By Sunday, we were able to bring the little guy home.

I must give a huge “Thanks” to all of the doctors and nurses we worked with in the couple of days Zayne was in the NICU. Every single one was kind and helpful, and willing to take the time to answer our silly questions and assure us that everything was going to be OK. Having a baby in the NICU is tough, but I felt completely assured that he was getting the absolute best care possible.

We just got the call that the third fetal lung test was good, so we’re back on for having the baby today. (Yay!)

We were also told that the hospital does not have any openings at present, so they’ll call and tell us when we can go. (Ack!)

On pins and needles….

Tomorrow may or may not be Z day. The Mom had the fetal lung development test this afternoon, and failed two of the three criteria to have the baby tomorrow. They’re going to check the third piece, but that means sending things out to an external lab, so we may not hear anything until tomorrow afternoon.

At the earliest, we may be able to have the baby tomorrow afternoon or evening. If that doesn’t work, we’ll shoot for next Wednesday no matter what.

We’ve just returned from the hospital. Yes, it’s not the due date yet. No, he wasn’t early.

There’s nothing quite like having your wife wake you up at 4AM to tell you she’s been awake for a couple of hours and hasn’t felt the baby move. I couldn’t decide to jump in the car or throw up first. We tried to be rational, using all of the techniques they use at the checkups to make the little guy move around. First (before I woke) was ice water, milk, and soda. Next, we tried the spoons, which involves placing one spoon with the concave side on the belly, then whacking the everliving crud out of it with another. (I hate the spoons. It hurts my ears, I’m convinced the kid will have tinnitus from birth.) Still nothing. As a last resort, we tried the shower with hot and cold water. No change.

So, we called grandma to watch the other kid, and piled into the car. In case you’ve ever wondered, the Honda Element is incredibly stable and quiet at 100MPH+.

Once we arrived at the hospital, they hooked The Mom up to the monitoring machines and got a strong fetal heartbeat right off the bat. After several hours of waiting, The Mom was given the equivalent of her twice weekly exam, which includes a very thorough sonogram. By this time, however, the little guy had been kicking and eluding the fetal heart monitor for some time, so we figured that everything was okay. We were given a clean bill of health and sent home soon after.

I’m glad everything is okay, but I sure hope Z day gets here soon. I had a flashback to losing our last one, and that was almost too much for me.

So. Here we are. In six days, we’re going to have a new addition. We know it’s six days because The Mom is going to be induced at exactly 36 weeks. There are reasons for this, first and foremost being the fact that we lost our last baby at 37 weeks and our OB is doing everything possible so we can bring our baby home this time.

By “everything possible,” I mean it. For the last 8 weeks or so, The Mom has been going to the hospital twice a week where they attach all manner of contraptions and measure everything there is to be measured. So far, the little guy has been ahead of schedule and passing his tests with flying colors. According to the hospital, he’s actually a week or so ahead developmentally.

Only six more days. Hopefully we can stay sane until then!