Roadblock to Happiness #458

Telling an emotional, hormonal woman that she can take her baby home after a week in the hospital is one thing.

Telling an emotional, hormonal woman (who is fully dressed and ready to go) that she can't take her baby home yet because the woman needs to go to the ER to get checked out is enough for an emotional meltdown.

Guess which one happened to me?

Around 1:30pm, we were waiting for our discharge paperwork to come in to the NICU so we could take Avonlea home. I needed to go to the bathroom and talk to the lactation consultant upstairs, so I told the NICU nurse I would be right back.  When I went to the bathroom, I passed a huge blood clot--probably the size of a softball. I called my doctor, but their office was closed, so I decided to ask upstairs on the women's floor what I should do.

While I went upstairs, I noticed that I was bleeding a lot. I have been bleeding since my surgery--not so much of a surprise--but this was a significant amount more.

After I talked to the lactation consultant, I asked the nurse on duty what I should do. They weren't really sure, since I was no longer a patient. They graciously checked me out, though. Although they thought that maybe the clots were from my breast feeding, they thought that I should call my doctor. I did call again, only to learn that they are out of the office on Fridays. I called the doctor on call, and she said that if the bleeding continued for the next half hour, I should go to the ER.

I went back to the NICU and scrubbed in--and realized that I am allergic to the NICU soap. Every day my arms would burn a little bit, but this day they burned a lot, and they got really red and bumpy. I was hoping that this would be the last day for scrubbing in!

The nurse was concerned about me, since I was only supposed to go to the bathroom, and I ended up being gone for so long. When I told her about the bathroom, she got more concerned and flustered. Nick arrived shortly after, and we watched a mandatory CPR video while I filled him in on my bathroom drama.

We finished the video and packed everything up, and I was getting really emotional. I was getting asked over and over if I was okay, and I just wanted to get Avonlea and go. Finally, just before I was to sit down in the wheelchair and get Avonlea and go down to the car, Nick said he wanted me to go and check one more time.

Well, I had bled through the 2 pads I got from the nurses, and I was leaking onto my undies and pants.

Well, that was it. They wheeled me down to the ER instead, and they kept Avonlea in the NICU while we figured out what was going on.

I had blood drawn, urine sample taken, an ultrasound done (both internal and external), and another blood draw. Turns out, my hemoglobin levels were pretty low, so they gave me a shot to help slow down the bleeding, and monitored me for a couple of hours to see if my levels would go up.

They didn't go up at all, but they sent me home anyway. We kept reminding them that we had to go and get our daughter from the NICU, which I think helped influence their decision. They gave me a prescription for a medicine that would help my bleeding to stop....but after a drama session of Nick trying to find this obscure drug all over the Valley, it turns out I probably won't be taking it because it says that it can cause harm to a breastfeeding baby.

I am feeling better today. Low hemoglobin is a sign of anemia, so my neighbor gave me some iron supplements to take. It causes exhaustion and a loss of concentration, which hasn't been good for my emotional state today. But, we're getting through it all right.

Again, much acknowledgements to Nick for going above and beyond. He helped to soothe me as my emotions threatened to take over me in the ER. He went and got a breast pump for me from the NICU so that I could send milk up to Avonlea. He held my hand through the ultrasound when they mentioned that a possibility could be a D&C procedure. He fetched a breast pump (again) when we ended up being in the ER longer than we originally thought. He drove to 3 different pharmacies and called probably 8 more in search of my prescription--and bought me heavier pads in the process. What a man.

And at the end of the night, this emotional, exhausted, anemic momma got to take her baby home. Finally.