I realize I never mentioned where I gave birth, hence the title :) Anyway, here is a continuation of the clinic stay. (Here, hospitals and clinics are different things. Hospitals are state run and usually sketchy. Clinics are private and so generally nicer.)
Let's start with Sunday night. I didn't appreciate Sunday night. Nurses are constantly coming in to check your vitals and palpitate your stomach to facilitate uterine shrinking and postpartum bleeding. OUCH! Plus side, my one nurse the first day was Gloria. Even though I only had her one shift, I won't ever forget her because she's Mormon! :) Thanks to Google Translate, I asked her in the middle of the night if I'd be able to see my baby the next day, which she said yes to. It's hard to give birth and not see your baby until 24-ish hours later.
Monday morning, Carmela came to the clinic to pick up Matt so he could pick Henlie up from our friends' house. Christina is also pregnant and was having her mid-pregnancy ultrasound that day. Matt also went to our house to pick up some supplies, then Carmela and Henlie played at the clinic for a little bit. I was missing my little girl! After a little while, Carmela took Henlie. They went and played with her grandson, Sebastian.
Carmela, Henlie, and Matt
Henlie had a breakfast of pineapple juice and cookies :)
She also wanted the orange juice, but we convinced her to save it for when Mommy was allowed to have liquids again.
Monday morning, I was put on a liquid/bland diet for breakfast, which was goo and anise tea. I've never been a tea/infusion person, but I've had way more teas than ever before since moving here. (Had some tea for flu symptoms while I was pregnant as well. Not very yummy.)
Goo and Tea
They told Matt they wanted him to go to the nursery. I was jealous. They had done x-rays of his stomach and chest, and they looked good. They had done infection screens, but they came back negative. (Infection in mother or baby is the typical reason for premature labor. Neither of us had an infection...) They also started turning down his respirator. They started feeding Andrew to see how he would take it, and we looked into finding a breast pump. I didn't bring mine because I had no intention of using it... oh well. Another friend from the ward offered to lend me hers, and since the other option was buy another brand new one, I took her up on her offer. Oh yeah, they don't have a hospital grade pump. Or any pump actually. Also, you know the giant diaper pads? Yeah, I got some because someone had left some, but you have to bring your own of those too. Pretty much nothing is provided, including baby diapers, not that we found out about that until later. Apparently they had some to use still from other people.
Matt took a couple more photos that morning.
That morning, they removed my catheter and told me they'd take my IV out when the current bag was done. In reality, I got another one or two smaller bags before they took it out. They eventually got me up out of bed and helped me shower. Then I got to finally walk down the hall to the nursery to see Lil Dude :)
Matt and I had talked about names and I had researched some name meanings Sunday night. I felt Lil Dude was strong and a fighter, so I looked up names with those meanings. On Nameberry, Andrew came up under fighter and Drew came up under strong. Fortunately, Andrew was a name on our list. I talked to Matt about it, and he was okay with it. Then he asked about a middle name, so I went back to our list and saw Guy paired with a different name. I asked Matt, and he was okay with it. (Guy is my Grandpa Wilson's name.) I decided I wanted to actually see my baby before the name was finalized and announced, though.
I was so excited to see my Lil Dude (the nickname we'd been using on Facebook since he had no name :)) His head was kind of blue and the rest of him was very red. It was painful to watch him try to breathe because his little chest was so concave. They opened his incubator and let me touch him.
After we visited the NICU, we officially announced his name on Facebook, Andrew Guy Biggs. My diet got upgraded as well, so I got some actual food for lunch :) I also ended up with another IV, this time in my right arm, because my doctor, Dr. Quispe, wanted to give me some iron. Every time he sees me, he thinks I'm too pale. Sorry, I'm white. lol I also started pumping in the afternoon. Pumping with Andrew went a lot better than pumping with Henlie. Perhaps because that's all I was doing for him, where with Henlie, it was mostly just at work to replace what she ate while I was gone. (In theory. It took awhile to build up the store.)
Lunch. Much more tasty than goo :)
We also had other visitors. McMillens came by, and Eliza had made us cookies. I was super happy when my diet was upgraded to the point I could eat them. They were yummy :) We also were visited by the Relief Society presidency. Although, I couldn't tell you which day they came :) Carmela's other daughter, Estefani, also came by, I think Monday. She gave us some goodies, including hand-me-downs for Andrew and a princess dress for Henlie, which she LOVED.
Henlie getting to try on her princess dress Tuesday. "I love my dress!"
I don't know where else to put this, but Henlie stayed at Leslie's house Monday night. Night 2, second house. :)
Tuesday was also more of the same. In some ways, I'm glad Andrew was in the NICU because it let me heal from my c-section. In others, it was really weird to not have my baby in my room. Mostly we played on the internets, watched TV, and entertained visitors. Oh, and I pumped every 2-3 hours and took milk to the NICU. Then I'd go back to pick up my pump so I could do it again. Fun times...
Andrew made some poop Tuesday morning. Good news for his digestive system :) He also looked better in terms of color when I got to visit him. He got to hang out under lights for jaundice a lot too. They also switched him to a CPAP since he was acting like the breathing tube was bothering him. He had more Xrays to ensure all of the gasses were going where they should, and they were.
Later, Carmela and Leslie brought Henlie and Sebastian over. Henlie saw the orange juice sitting on the table still. She grabbed it and brought it to me. She remembered it was for Mommy :) I asked if she was going to take care of Mommy, and she said yes :)
Leslie's legs (haha), Henlie, Sebastian, and Carmela
Henlie stayed with us for the afternoon. Daddy had been missing his little girl. Mostly she watched cartoons and snuggled her daddy, or she stole his phone to play with. She also got to see Andrew through the NICU window. He had his blue lights on. It was helpful because she could tell which baby was ours. For a long time after that, he was her "blue baby brother." That night, she stayed at Abby and Rob's house. Night 3, third house. She had a blast, I'm told. Actually, she was really good for everyone, or so they all told us.
Daddy getting some snuggles in.
Also, that's where he slept. I don't think it was all that comfy for him.
Getting to see "blue baby brother."
I don't even remember what the appetizers were supposed to be, but they were weird.
That cake, though. YUM!
Wednesday morning was spent getting ready to go home, mostly. Matt said we had to be checked out by 11 am, otherwise they'd charge us an extra day. In typical Peru fashion, it took forever. But since it was on them, not on us, we weren't charged. They actually had us checked out in the system on time I guess.
There were more check-ups Wednesday morning. Dr. Quispe came to check on me. My feet and legs were swollen. I'd not had swelling after delivery with Henlie, but I learned it was perfectly normal to go 2 weeks with swelling. He prescribed me some pain pills and iron pills. He also gave us an update on Andrew. There was a valve between his heart and lungs that wasn't closing, but he said it should heal on its own as he grew.
Andrew held my hand :)
Here he is on his CPAP
Carmela kindly took us home from the clinic. She drove nice and slow, which was great for my non-existent core muscles. (Oh, I totally got a girdle/belly band thing too, which was awesome while I needed it :))
It was pretty weird to go home without the baby. It was also hard on all of us just the upheaval of it all. While Henlie did well at so many people's houses, she was all out of whack when she got back to us. It took weeks for her to sleep well again. It was also super hard for me and her because I couldn't lift her at all. For weeks, Matt had to change her because I couldn't get to the floor to do it. She had to be so careful around my stomach. Matt really stepped in and did awesome at being Mommy and Daddy because even though I was there, I was pretty useless between C-section recovery and constant pumping.
Anyway, that covers the rest of my clinic stay, and this post is already super long, so I'm cutting it off :)
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