2 Days Old! (9-21-12)

Today was a day that Kim and I thought we would never get a chance to see Hudson.  The night before was our last night in the hospital and we had no idea where we were going to stay Friday night, we had 3 options.  Option 1: Get a room at Ronald McDonald's House (with a waiting list and the amount of people requesting to stay, it might be awhile), Option 2: Do what is called, In-Room at the hosptial - this entailed us officially discharging however we could stay in our room with no services provided at no additional cost and 2 meals provided they had the beds available and did not need them, however at any point in time they could come to us and say get out we need the bed, which is understandable and Option 3: Stay with Sara - Kim's sister who lives about 20 minutes away from Hudson.  We did not find out where we were staying until the afternoon and it was in fact Option 1!!!  We felt very fortunate.  More to come on this later.

The morning consisted of the usual doctor visits and nurse check-ups.  We met with a social worker because I wanted to be proactive to discuss any financial questions I had and come to find out, I went to DePauw with both her and her husband  Small world and she remembered me [I wonder why... :-)]  Any way, she did a great job of answering all of inquiries and was pretty awesome.  As soon as she left the pharmacy came up and said that we can put our prescriptions in then pick them up later, so we went ahead with that.  As soon as she left the lactation consultant arrived to check on us and I mentioned to her that I would like to shop from her "store".  I ended up buying a pump, a hands free hold the pumping things for Kim so she doesn't have to hold them every time and a new nursing bra for Kim because she only had one to use.  All in all, a good shopping trip and they saved us some money!!!

Then we ate lunch quickly but still had to see the nurses to get officially discharged, meet the birthing records person who did not come the day before which made me a little bit fussy to be honest.  After all of that, which takes some time and some preliminary packing it was now around 2 pm and we still hadn't seen our son!!  All of this adult stuff is tiring.  We called over to check how he was doing a couple of times and the nurse would not be too specific on some of the tests he had done earlier such as a brain ultrasound and chest X-Ray.  She said we needed to talk to the doctor.

When we got to Riley the doctor immediately came to talk to us and he had good news to share.  Hudson did not have IVH or bleeding on the brain which premie babies typically do.  They will do another scan when he is 10 days old to confirm but this could be a major win for Team Hudson!  His lungs are continually improving, slowly.  This is another good sign and his blood gasses are getting closer and closer to what they want.  They shared some numbers with us and they were pretty bad the first 12 hours he was born.  We were also informed the exploratory surgery that they wanted to do on Wednesday night is now scheduled for Monday because of his improvement with his lungs and blood gasses.  When Monday.....they don't know because the OR team has to come to him, which means they need a significant amount of time to relocate all of their stuff to the NICU, perform surgery and move it back. 

After the doctor left, a family support person talked us then a research assisant talked to us about including Hudson in a couple of clinical studies.  Kim talked to her while I visted with my Grandma Murray and Aunt Cheryl that had stopped by to see him. 

We needed to be back to University Hospital by 4 to officially get discharged and pack the car.  I took 3 trips to the car with stuff, while Kim got a shot.  Then we headed to Ronald McDonald's house.  We checked in and were overwhelmed with how awesome this place is!  We have our own room with a sink and share a bathroom with another room.  There is a comunity kitchen that everyone can use.  Some other awesome things that occured are a family came in to cook the entire house dinner and watch Lorax.  The dinner was awesome, home cooked mashed potatos, corn, rolls, mac & cheese, green beans and ham along with chicken and grilled hot dogs!!!  They family also brought in quarters for people to get a soda from the pop machine here, yes it is only $0.25.  Save you pop tabs and give them to Ronald's house, it helps support all of the wonderful stuff going on here!  We also had a Kiwanis group provide breakfast this morning.  Yummy, it makes it a lot easier on us. 

We are a couple of blocks away from Hudson and can walk there.  We had a great day yesterday and as the doctor told us he was very pleased with is progress so far!!  That a kid, keep on keeping on!!  He held my pinky for at least 30 minutes last night, very precious.  It's moments like this that I just want to take him out of the incubator and hold him, but we can't.  This is hard on us but we know it is what is best for Hudson right now. 

If you wish to send mail to us:

Ronald McDonald House
Attn: Ben and Kim Murray, Room 17
435 Limestone Street
Indianapolis, IN 46202-2819

Here's to another good day!!