On Friday, February 8th we welcomed our precious baby boy into this world. Grady Leonard Elkins was born at 2:58 pm, after nearly 24 hours of labor, perfect in every way to his 'couldn't be happier' parents! But, the process of meeting him wasn't a simple journey; nor would going home be... Because mom had some issues with maintaining stable oxygen levels and heart rate, Grady also suffered the same issues. The medical staff was right on top of these issues and were able to alleviate/stabilize them quickly each time they occurred. Also, mom was 'ruptured' (
rupturing of the amniotic sac; waters breaking) for an extended period of time and Grady needed to have a few blood tests performed before leaving the hospital with a clean bill of health. Once the amniotic sac ruptures, the baby is essentially exposed to the environment and the longer the time between this occurring and baby being born there is an increased chance of the baby developing an infection (of a variety of types). On Sunday, Grady and mom were discharged and allowed to go home on the condition that we return to meet with the pediatrician on Monday morning and have another screening done to monitor some levels that the staff found to be a little "off." Grady's blood was taken again Monday and a CBC, band count and a blood culture was performed. The CBC counts the different types of cells in the blood; an elevated white blood cell count signals an infection as these cells play a specific role in the body's immune system. The blood culture is a test used to find a bacterial infection in the blood and the band count puts a number to the amount of neutrophils within the blood. These cells, again, have a specific role within the immune system. An elevation of the band count is not necessarily specific for infection, but may be secondary to inflammatory processes, metabolic abnormalities, etc. After this round of testing, Grady had an elevated WBC count and an elevated band count. The pediatrician made the decision to admit him immediately to the children's hospital and start him on a round of antibiotics. Grady didn't show any obvious symptoms of being sick but, with newborns sometimes that can be very difficult to "see" in the patient so, most often they treat whatever the lab reports show. The only way to administer antibiotics to newborn is via IV at very low doses, so he needed to receive these treatments in the Sanford Children's Hospital. After a few days of being on fluids/antibiotics, Grady began showing improvement in his blood screenings and on Wednesday morning we received some good news from our doctor on rounds. Grady's cell levels were back in the normal range and he would only need to continue with the antibiotics for a couple more days to ensure that whatever bacteria was in his system was flushed out completely. We should, assuming that these levels stay normal and we don't develop any other issues, be discharged on Friday the 15th. That will have been a full week of being in the hospital for both Grady and mommy. Grama Jill has been staying with us in the hospital, cuddling/spoiling Grady and helping mom in more ways than she knows! We cannot fully describe how eager we are to reunite with daddy at home and finally get a chance to settle in. We must extend a thank you to each and every one of you that were thinking about us during our recovery and adding us to your daily prayers. There is no doubt that we were being looked-after by a higher power and continue to be as we recover. God is good!
Every body tells me I look 'just like my daddy' :)
Proud Grama Jill and Grampa Bob;
Grama Christi and Grampa Gary are eager to cuddle me at the end of February!
Sanford Medical Center Announcement - We rate them 5 STARS as we had the best RNs/CNAs to take care of us during our stay - THANK YOU
