Baby Boy Newman's First Days

Hi,
In an effort to keep everyone posted of Baby Boy Newman's progress, we decided it would be easiest to create this blog to track his progress through the NICU.

Baby Boy Newman was born by c-section on Monday, February 9th. Following in the footsteps of his brother, Ilan, delivery was earlier than planned - although not quite as much of an emergency situation. Kerry was admitted to the hospital Sunday night the 8th with elevated liver counts and when they kept going up, the doctors decided to deliver at 33 weeks and 6 days.

Baby Boy Newman weighed in at 4lbs even at birth and was initially breathing on his own. The fluid in the abdomin (ascites) which the doctors had been following closely throughout Kerry's pregnancy only appeared in trace amounts - which was great news!

Baby Boy Newman's breathing became a little more labored after his admission to the NICU. While Kerry and David are surprised at this finding (especially because Ilan had no breathing issues at 32 weeks), apparently this is very typical behavior in a 34 weeker. In fact, some times babies who are 34 weeks old do worse than the ones born earlier because they have some strength and try to fight the machines a little more - thus working too hard.

The doctors discovered a small tear in the lungs (pneumothorax) which was causing some of the difficulty and have inserted a small chest tube to relieve pressure. The tear should heal on it's own after several days. They also decided to intubate Baby Boy Newman to make sure he was geting the oxygen he needs. They are taking blood gasses pretty frequently to determine the amount of oxygen the baby is getting and adjusting the levels on the intubater (pressure, amount of oxygen, etc) so he is getting what he needs.

Kerry is healing nicely from her csection and her liver counts already started coming down within 12 hours after delivering. She has started pumping so that when Baby Boy Newman is ready to be fed (right now he is being fed through an iv until they sabalize his breathing) her milk will be waiting for him. Kerry is expected home from the hospital on this Friday, February 13th.

We will try to post some pictures soon. Thanks to everyone for their wonderful wishes, calls, etc. Your support means so much to us.