One helicopter ride and 23 days in the hospital.....the journey of Evan James

I wanted to have a "timeline" of Evan's story.  The entire 6 weeks since he has been born have been a blur to me, but I can finally relax a little more and would like to have his journey documented.

Evan was born on Monday January 14th, 2013 at 0:02am. He was 8lbs 6oz and I think he was 21inches long (I don't even remember, because everything was so hectic right away.....I am sure it is documented somewhere).  He had meconium aspiration at birth and they took him to the nursery right away.  I got to hold him for just a few seconds.  They told us that he will probably be back in our room in an hour or so.  Well, an hour later the nurse came back to tell us that he is on oxygen and has an IV and will not be back for the entire night.  His chest X-ray did not look good and he has to work out the stuff in his lungs. I was really upset and scared.  I was finally able to get up around 4 am and we were able to go see him in the nursery.  He was perfect!We did not get to hold him yet.  After more sleepless hours we were able to hold him around 9am.  They did another chest x-ray and it already looked a lot better.  He had to stay on oxygen and the IV for the rest of the day.  By noon I was able to try and nurse him.  He had no issues with that.  So, I went in to feed him every 3 hours and by 6pm that night he was able to come to our room for the first time.

Here are his first pictures

 They wanted to keep him another day for observation, but he did great throughout Tuesday and they told us we would be going home on Wednesday.

Finally big sister got to meet him on Tuesday.  She was so proud and excited!

The very first  family picture

By Wednesday morning he was a little jaundiced and had to stay another 24 hours to be under the bill light.  He was in the nursery all day except for feedings.  I noticed that he was really sleepy and didn't eat well at all, but at the time they thought that was because of the jaundice.  He also looked like he was breathing really heavy and we pointed that out to the nurses, but they said that he had just been upset and that's what was causing his heavy breathing. He did not eat well at all throughout the night and I kept thinking that I will need to meet with a lactation consultant in the morning.  On Thursday morning January 17th he had turned blue and was breathing really heavy.  They called the NICU doctor down who admitted him into the NICU right away.  They started to draw labs for all kinds of testing (viruses, infections, metabolic diseases ect).  They placed several lines in him and he was on oxygen.  They performed a heart ECHO, which was read by the cardiologists in Little Rock.  I was such a mess that day, but had finally decided to leave the hospital for a bit to pick up Hannah from school.  I was gone for about 45min when I got a call from Scott saying that Angel One was on its way to pick up Evan and take him to Arkansas Childrens Hospital in Little Rock, because his heart was weak.  I was surprisingly calm at that point (mainly because Hannah was in the car with me).  I dropped Hannah and my mom off at home and headed back to the hospital.  By that point I was starting to lose it.  I met Scott and the NICU and the Angel One team arrived shortly after that (around 3pm).  They said that they would not take me with them, because I had just given birth a few days before (or probably because I was a mess), but they agreed to take Scott.  I was so thankful for that.  It was so hard to see them load up Evan.  It still makes my stomach hurt just thinking about it.  I watched the helicopter take off and just fell to my knees crying in the parking lot of the hospital (several people walked by and not a single person asked if I was ok).  Then I rushed home to pack up some stuff, so that my mom, Hannah and I could get on the road to Little Rock.  I remember feeling numb at that point.  Scott's parents started driving to Bentonville in the mornings when Evan was moved to the NICU.  They stopped in Kansas City to pick up Allison and then continue their drive all the way to Little Rock.  By the time we got on the road Scott and Evan were already in Little Rock. I felt so bad that Scott had to be there by himself.  I received a text from Scott saying that he was so scared and that is when it really hit me.  Another text said that they are worried about his other organs not getting enough blood due to his weak heart.   I sent out a prayer request on Facebook and immediately people started praying for our sweet boy and passing on the prayer request to friends and family.  Evan had hundreds of people praying for him all over the world.  The drive was long and exhausting.  We finally made it around 10pm and I was so happy to be there, but I was also very scared to go see him.  I didn't know what to expect.  I broke down as soon as I walked into his room.  It was extremely hard to see my sweet newborn baby with all the lines in his body with medication flowing through them, all hooked up to monitors and the shades for the bili light.  They had started him on antibiotics (in case it was an infection causing his heart failure), heart and blood pressure medicine.  Scotts parents and Allison arrived around 11pm and it was so good to see them (Hannah was at the hotel with my mom by then.....she was not allowed on the NICU floor and I wouldn't have taken her in anyway).  Scott's parents decided to spend the night by Evan's side.  I was so exhausted by that point that I was good with going to the hotel and trying to get a little rest.

This is turning into a lot longer of a story than I originally anticipated (I was just going to outline his journey along with pictures).  Once I started typing it felt really good to write it all down.  I don't remember every day in this much detail, but I just want to write down what comes to my mind.