I don't like Thursdays

The steroids got weaned down over the course of 7 days, His oxygen requirement had come down well... it wasn't at the perfect 21% but it came down to low 30's, his lowest since the honeymoon first week he was born. One fact about oxygen I forgot in a previous blog is this "Parent's mood and attitude to the world directly correlates to their neonate's oxygen requirements" Low 30's therefore made us see beauty in the weeds growing along the freeway.
I also neglected to mention that Christmas fell during this time. If I were a psychologist, I would think the fact that I neglected to mention it may also be a reflection of my guilt. Our 21 month old got a few presents and a big girl bed etc etc but she didn't get a Christmas. She got breakfast with our new neighbours, a trip to see her brother and some ham for dinner, but she didn't get a Christmas. Ok, she is not even two, she will not be scarred for life, I know this. If I was in a less woe-is-me frame of mind I would even realise that it was never going to be a big traditional Christmas as I was meant to be 7 months pregnant so we were not going to visit our family in NZ, it was always going to be just the 3 of us.

Anyway... boxing day, at 11 weeks old, my husband had his first cuddle and things were looking pretty good. Pop quiz : What happens when roller coasters go up?
New Years Eve. Thursday. We are having a barbecue at our place with 4 couples and their toddlers. I called the hospital for my update and although Nico was fine, the nurse told me that 2 hours ago they had had to resuscitate him! I asked if I should come in but she said that there was really nothing to worry about, he was doing fine until it happened and he was doing fine again now so it must have just been something in his airway. I hung up not feeling fantastic but I also knew I needed a night with good company so I tried on my happy face mask and made it fit. I called the hospital every 1 or 2 hours and got the same report, he was settled and well. To state the obvious, it played on my mind all night and even when we went to the hospital at 10am the next day I couldn't shake it. All i was thinking was "Did he actually die?" I couldn't talk to my husband about that kind of thing, he would tell me to stop being melodramatic and secretly go into a darker place than he (we) already was. It took about 3 days til I just had to tell someone what I was thinking. I chose carefully as the 'wrong' answer (ie the one I was not fishing for) could have made me feel worse, but also not someone who would just go "Of course not honey" just to appease me. I asked a wonderful person via Facebook chat, she had been here on NYE so knew what I was talking about. She took a moment to think, talked to her husband about it and came back with the perfect answer
Q If you get resuscitated, does that mean you died? A: No. It just means you could have if they hadn't intervened.
When we did go in the next day, it was the same nurse looking after him who had been there when it happened. She said it was actually quite amazing because usually they are slow to pick up after something like that but her words were "Once he came back, he opened his eyes and looked at us as if saying 'Umm... excuse me. What are you doing? Back off' and was back to his normal self"
I approached the doctors to ask if I should be concerned and they explained it was 'purely mechanical' and there was no problem with him, he must have just had some secretions blocking an airway.
The fact that that happened then, in hind sight, was the best thing that could have happened. If it didn't happen, there would have been chaos the following Thursday. The whole hospital would have heard a call over the PA "Adult Code Blue, NICU Bay 8. Adult Code Blue, NICU Bay 8" as I had went into cardiac arrest.
After arriving at the hospital at 6am (as I usually do on Tuesdays and Thursdays to have a full day with our almost 2 y/o) I was elated. His oxygen was great, he was really settled and looked fabulous. While his nurse was doing handover at her other crib, I watched his SpO2 (blood oxygen saturation) drop and drop and not climb up like it should. When it got to 50% I motioned quietly for one of the nurses waiting her turn to come over and check him. She looked, said he was ok and we both watched. Next thing his heart rate plummets from his usual 170 to 40 and still dropping. Docs are called and come running. Around a crib that can hardly fit 3 people around it, there are 2 doctors and 4 nurses. Needless to say, I was not in the huddle. I was pacing around reminding myself of last Thursday and how it had been perfectly fine, so fine they hadn't even bothered to call me to tell me it happened, just waited til I rung.
5 -10 minutes later, I was beside him again, he had slightly high oxygen requirements but was settled and behaving normally. When I called that afternoon, his oxygen was even better than it had been pre-episode. The nurse and I concluded that the doctors hypothesis was incorrect, there was no blocked airway, Nico simply did not like Thursdays.