Adjustments

We are loving being home with our girl and her fixed heart.  Even though we have been home less than a week, we have already noticed changes in Evin.

Evin no longer has labored breathing while taking a bottle.  Before her surgery, I always noticed that she was breathing a little bit more heavily, but now I realize how heavy she was breathing now that she is NOT breathing that way.

She enjoys eating more!  This is one thing that I had been hoping and praying would change for her.  Before her surgery, she never really knew what it was like to be hungry, or if she did, she just didn’t care that she was hungry.  Now she will actually cry for a bottle when she is hungry.  It is wonderful to have a baby that actually likes to eat!  Now, I won’t go and say she is an eating machine and is hungry all the time, but it is a definite improvement from her pre-surgery appetite.

Before her surgery, Evin slept through the night, every night since she was 5 weeks old.  We would have to wake her up to eat.  The last 2 nights she has woken up around 3:30 wanting to eat.  Call me crazy for being excited to be woken in the middle of the night, but like I said, it is pretty thrilling to have Evin want to eat!

Now for the not-so-good changes…

She fights sleep like crazy!  It is almost like she remembers that bad things happened to her when she went to sleep in the hospital, so she tries her hardest not to sleep.  Before her surgery, I could easily get her to sleep in just a couple of minutes.  Now, she will fuss, throw her arms and legs around, rip her paci out of her mouth, and do everything she can to prevent herself from drifting off to sleep.  It makes me sad that she does this!

She wants our full attention pretty much all the time.  For an entire week in the hospital, Mitch or I were right by her bedside 24/7.  She got accustomed to us being there, looking at her, all the time.  Since we have been home, she has decided she would like the undivided attention to continue.  I can be sitting right in front of her and look away for just a few seconds, and she starts fussing until I look back and then she will grin.  She does this over and over.  I think she would be content with the 3 of us living in a little 12x12 room like we had in the hospital.  We are working on her gaining some of her independence back!  :)

Of course, we are so incredibly happy to be home.  These minor issues really aren’t a big deal, and make me more sad than anything.  I hate that she feels like she can’t fall asleep or doesn’t want us to look away from her.  Hopefully she will start to feel more comfortable and trusting in weeks to come.

Other notable changes…

We no longer have to give Evin baby Aspirin!  Every day we would have to cut the pill, crush it up, mix it with breastmilk, put it in a syringe, and give it to her.  She hated how it tasted, so we are excited to no longer have to give it.

We still have the pulse oximeter from Cook’s Home Health, but we no longer feel the need to check her oxygen saturation daily.  I have checked it once or twice since we have been home and it was 99-100.  Amazing!

Evin’s incision seems to be healing nicely.  She still has the tape like bandages called steri-strips on her chest, but they should fall off in the next few weeks.  Every night after her bath we have to do wound care, where we clean the incision, but Evin doesn’t seem to mind it. 

We love being home and making these adjustments to find our new normal with our peanut!