NICU

So, the reason all of this is so late is that Ian ended up in the NICU. But, once again, I am getting ahead of myself.

Once Betsy got settled in the room, they brought Ian in to us. The grandparents saw him, then left us alone. We tried to feed Ian, but he was much more interested in sleeping. We assumed he was exhausted from that whole trip down the birth canal thing. His head was completely black and blue, so clearly he had been using that as a battering ram for a couple of days on Betsy's pelvis. Not much fun for Ian or Betsy.

Ian wanted to sleep, and so did we. He was a little limp, so we decided to send him back to the nursery. The nurse said she would send him back to our room when it was time to feed him again around 11:00. At midnight, we became a little concerned that we had not heard back from the nursery. We called down there and they told us Ian was under a heat lamp. Apparently he had been unable to keep his temperature up and they needed to make sure he was warm enough. Ok, that sounds reasonable. The nurse told us he would spend an hour on the lamp and then two hours off and he could come back to the room.

Betsy and I were a little concerned, so we walked down the nursery just to look through the glass and see Ian under his heat lamp. The nurse came to talk to us, but wouldn't give us much information.

I went back to the nursery a couple of times during the night and each time Ian was still under the heat lamps. This was becoming concerning. At some point the nurse told me that we would have to wait until our pediatrician came in the morning to know what was going to happen with Ian.

Our pediatrician showed up around 7:00 AM. We happened to go by the nursery when she was there. She said he wanted to talk to us about what was going on and followed us to our room.

It turns out they had given Ian three chances to warm up under the light and he still could not maintain his temperature. Apparently babies tend to get low temperatures rather than high fevers, but it is essentially the same thing. The most likely cause of the low temperature was some kind of infection, but they had no idea what. The really bad news was that Ian was going to have to spend some time in the neonatal ICU. He would have to get blood work done including a spinal tap. We would not know the results of the test for 72 hours and then if there was an infection, it could be another 7-10 days of antibiotics and Ian living in the NICU. Needless to say, there were a lot of tears and a lot of concern.

At around 10:00, we were able to go visit him after his spinal tap. Again, a lot of tears and concern. He had started IV antibiotics and was fairly limp, but he seemed to have a little more color than he did in the nursery. He had to spend 6 hours under the lights in the transition period before they would test his ability to maintain his temperature. We kept visiting him as often as possible, but we couldn't hold him or feed him until he was out from under the heat lamps.

Everyone, including our OB was surprised Ian was having this problem. He was an unlikely candidate for an infection. Luckily, Ian was able to hold his temperature and he was eating well and going to the bathroom well. Everything seemed to be checking out.




Eventually, we started doing Ian's feedings and held him as much as possible. Every time they pulled out the thermometer, we held our breath, and each time, he passed the test. On Thursday, Betsy was released from the hospital, but Ian had to stay. We thought he would be coming home on Saturday at the earliest. His tests kept coming back negative and if the cultures were clean after 72 hours, they told us he could probably come home. It was really tough to come home without Ian, but we didn't have much of a choice. The nurses let us stay at the hospital as late as we wanted on Thursday.



The next morning, we went to the NICU and met with the staff Dr. She said Ian looked good, but they needed to wait the 72 hours, which would have been Saturday morning, before sending him home. I then realized she seemed to be looking for any reason to send him home and eventually decided that since Saturday was Yom Kippur, she should send him home on Friday. We were thrilled, but nervous. We didn't want to get him home only to find out later that he had an infection requiring antibiotics and a trip to Texas Children's.

We went home to prepare the house for Ian and picked him up at around 4:00. He has been home for a little over 24 hours now and he seems to be just fine. He is doing everything a baby is supposed to do. He eats, sleeps, and poops.




Not that any of them are going to read this, but I do want to say that the nurses and other staff at the hospital were really amazing. The nurses in the NICU we had were incredibly compassionate and helpful. Not only did they take great care of Ian, but they also took great care of us. They even spent time with us teaching us how to change diapers, feed, bathe and otherwise take care of Ian. I don't know if every nurse in this hospital is great, but every one we dealt with was.

Ok, this is probably the last post that will be this long and this serious, unless there is another occasion that calls for it.

I promise some more entertaining posts soon.

Ian Parker Goldstein

Ian Parker Goldstein was born on September 18, 2007 at 3:24 PM. He weighed 7 lbs. 5 oz. and measured 20 inches. It was one hell of a ride. But, I am getting way ahead of myself.

Labor
Monday morning, Betsy and I called the hospital at 6:00 AM to see if we could get an appointment for induction. We wavered all weekend on whether or not Betsy really wanted to get induced. She was sure she would naturally go into labor in a day or two if she could just wait. In the end, we decided if the doctor thought induction was right, it was the right thing to do.

We actually called a few minutes before 6:00. I figured if everyone was calling at 6 and we called at 5:50, maybe we would get a spot before someone else. I don't know if it really works that way, but they told us to be in by 7:30 AM. We were on our way. When we got in, our Dr. was there and we were introduced to our nurse, Maria. At Texas Women's, they assign one nurse per delivery. Maria would be with us until her shift ended at 7:00 PM. She was amazing, so we got really lucky. Not only was she good at her job, but we liked her a lot, which was important since not much happened for hours ... and hours.

In fact, the entire first day of labor was totally non-eventful. Betsy had contractions all day, but nothing very painful. Nothing worse than what she had at home for weeks. So, we sat and talked all day. The grandparents and my sisters waited nervously and I occasionally went and told them what was going on. Eventually, Betsy's parents came back to the labor and delivery room for a while. My mom visited too.

At around 6:00 PM, our Dr. decided that there wasn't going to be a baby any time soon. Betsy was not significantly dilating. The Dr. took her off of the drugs, and let her eat dinner and get some sleep. His theory is he would rather let a mother eat and rest to have energy for delivery rather than have the labor continue through the night. I also got to go home for a few hours of sleep.

The next morning, I went to the hospital early and we had a new nurse. As she was introducing herself, Maria walked in! We couldn't have been more exited. I am sure our second nurse would have been great, but we loved Maria and were definitely disappointed that after getting to know her the whole day before we were going to have to deal with someone new. Although it was her day off, she came in and then switched assignments with another nurse to be with us for day two.

Betsy started feeling contractions that were pretty significant. About 20 minutes into that, she decided it was epidural time. No reason to suffer. Betsy was very nervous about the epidural. I would have been too, but it turned out it was no big deal. They do a great job at this hospital and it was fast and relatively painless. In fact, she had a tough time with an IV the day before that hurt a lot more than the epidural. After several hours of labor (but pain-free labor), Betsy was still not dilated to even 4 cm. Generally, after 4 cm things start going a lot faster. We were relaxed enough about it. The Dr. said she had 20 hours to get to 10 cm before he would call it off and order a c-section. After we both took a nap, Betsy said she was feeling some pressure. The nurse checked and she was 10 cm and Ian had completely dropped. It was time.

Delivery
Maria decided Betsy should do a couple of trial pushes. On the first push, I could see the top of his head. Amazing. He was right there. Time to call the Dr.

Betsy kept pushing until the Dr. arrived and Ian kept getting closer and closer. The push deal is 10 seconds of holding her breath and bearing down and that is done three times in a row during a contraction. The she rests until the next contraction. Some women have trouble figuring out how to push with an epidural in, but Betsy got it pretty much right away.

By the time the Dr. got there Ian was really close. I think he was only there for maybe four contractions and then he came out. It was absolutely amazing. I watched the whole thing and was nervous as hell. The baby does not move when his head is about to come out. I guess this is obvious -- he is way too lodged in there to move around. Still, I didn't know if everything was ok. He was mushed. He was a funny color. There was some stuff on his head that looked funny to me. Our Dr. called in an extra Dr. and an extra nurse (and there was a student watching). We had a room full of medical personnel and I thought maybe there was something he wasn't telling me. I kept asking if it was ok and he promised it was. Betsy pushed for under 30 minutes total. I started taking pictures and cut the umbilical cord, which is far harder to do than you would think.

They gave Ian to Betsy for a minute and then began to work on him. He was not breathing all that well, so he got some oxygen. There was a minutes of blue baby, but it went away pretty fast. He also had some pretty serious fluid in his lungs that Maria got out right away. Then he was given a diaper and handed off to Betsy. There were a lot of tears. The Bean was born.

Within the hour, the pediatrician came and checked him out. He was weighed and measured. He took his first poop and his diaper was changed. He breast fed. And we all hung out. I also went out to the waiting room and told everyone he was born and announced his name for the first time.

The baby went up to the nursery and I followed him up. We stopped by the waiting room so everyone could see him. They got Betsy ready and eventually I went with her to her postpartum room.

And then it really began ...

Monday Monday Monday

Happy Rosh Hashanah. A lot has happened this week.

1. On Monday we found out that Betsy is going to be scheduled for induction on Monday September 17. So barring either her going into labor before then or there being no rooms available, it looks like Monday is the day.

2. Wednesday was my birthday. Happy birthday to me. I am old. 35.

3. Rosh Hashanah. Shana Tova. Happy New Year for all of you non-Jews out there.

4. Hurricane Humberto came and went without even any rain. In fact, this was one of the first days without rain. So much for the theory that the change in barometric pressure would bring the baby.

5. This weekend coming up is the last free weekend of my life. Not sure exactly what this means, but it must be significant.

6. Monday we get to see what the Bean actually looks like. And you get to learn his name, which, by the way, is not very exciting, but it has been fun keeping everyone in suspense anyway.

There's a lot going on right now in our household, but we have all of the basics ready to go. Betsy has requested that I post a few pictures of the baby's room. It's not really been decorated yet, but you can see the furniture and bedding at least. Here it is.




So that's it, now we sit and wait.

College Football Season Arrives

The Bean likes football, he takes after me. We are not sure which teams he will be partial to. Living in Houston, he has to like the Texans. This one is painful. We feel for the guy. But one day they have to be better. At least he won’t have to watch David Carr play QB.

The Bean will have a lot more choices when it comes to college. Most of you probably know, but I am an alumn of quite a few schools.



First there was University of Colorado, then there was the University of Kentucky, next was the University of Michigan -- also his mother’s undergrad alma matter -- and finally the University of Texas. The Bean already has a Colorado shirt, although it probably won’t fit him for a while. We planned on having some Michigan gear for him, but now I am not so sure…

Yesterday was the season opener for all of my schools. Colorado played in-state rival Colorado State and actually won. Even the University of Kentucky destroyed Eastern Kentucky (remember, this is football not basketball). But somehow, some way, Michigan lost to I-AA Appalachian State! Are you kidding me? I am very excited that The Bean is going to be born at the beginning of football season. This should be the start of some great Saturdays and Sundays on the couch with The Bean watching some football. But now, I am just not so sure. How did Michigan lose? Two blocked field goals, are you kidding me? This is ridiculous. Let’s hope The Bean’s other college choices do better or I might be done with college football within the first month.

Ok, none of that is really about The Bean. Here is a new section that I will try to make a recurring theme. This is the unexpected pleasures and annoyances section.

Let’s start with an annoyance: Wills. Being a probate lawyer must be a little bit like being a hospice nurse. You are always helping people plan for death. It’s awful. Trying to draft a will and planning for your death at this age isn’t a lot of fun. Wills suck.

Unexpected Pleasure: Baby-sympathy parking spots. At the Texans’ preseason games, we convinced the parking attendants that they should really let us park up on the first row. These spots are reserved for serious tailgaters, handicapped parking, and vips. Apparently, if you point to the belly of your 8-month pregnant wife, that will get you up there too. Not much time left to take advantage of this unexpected bonus.

What have I missed?

First, there was conception. Ok, not going there. Let's move on.

First, there was The Bean. His first good picture is here. Isn't he handsome? He is literally waving to the camera. Way to go Bean. Pretty soon he will be learning to drive.

Betsy went through all of the typical pregnancy stuff. First the morning sickness. It was lovely. Despite the fact that she never once actually threw up, we had a lot of fun with this whole period. Betsy insisted on eating very very crunchy crackers pretty much all the time. Most of the time this was no big deal. In the middle of the night? Not so much fun. The crunching was only half of the problem. Rolling over onto cracker crumbs was an unexpected little gift. Solution: buy a new bed. This whole pregnancy thing made us decide it was time to buy a king bed. So we did. I would like to tell you that the king bed is the greatest thing that's ever happened to us, but it's not here yet. What's the only thing that takes longer than the gestation period of a human (and don't say an elephant's gestation period, which is a quick 22 months -- if your wife is pregnant and complaining just constantly say, "at least you're not an elephant." She will love this). Anyway, thanks to some stellar work by Room and Board, we are still waiting and the baby will probably truly arrive before the bed.

After the morning sickness stuff came some basic stomach cramping and other maladies that come with the belly starting to expand. This was an odd period where Betsy was basically concerned that every strange feeling in her stomach was something bad happening with the baby. Of course, none of it was, but it didn't stop both of us from worrying.

Next comes a complete tease. Betsy felt just fine. Sure, she was growing, but she really felt as good as ever. This lasted for a while.

The final stage is total discomfort. Now Betsy is getting bigger (everyone says she looks really small, but it doesn't help how she actually feels). It is hot. This is Houston. This is August. After a surprisingly comfortable start to the summer, the heat finally hit. It's not much fun to be pregnant in Houston in August. It's not much fun to be married to someone who is pregnant in August.

But, we are now very well prepared. We have taken breast feeding class. If there are any guys out there who think for some reason this might be fun (the words breast and class in the title might fool some), you are wrong. Luckily, we spent most of our time checking out the other parents to be and trying to figure out if we were more or less prepared than others. Our best guess is we fell right in the middle somewhere. We were probably doing better than the girl whose husband was too busy to make it to class and not as prepared as the couple with the future dad wearing loafers with gold buckles and no socks.

We also went to a marathon baby birth class. This is where the action really gets good. Lots of videos of baby birth. The process is made to look really unappealing. A friend of mine from my poker group was in the class. I had no idea that his wife was pregnant. He didn't know mine was pregnant. Clearly we have some deep conversations at our poker game. I could tell you a lot about this guy's new grill, but I couldn't tell you his wife's name. Gotta love guys. In my defense, he talks about his grill all the time, I know, it's a little strange. The baby class was filled with lots of useful information. Most importantly, women should breathe while they are in labor. This may seem obvious, but trust me on this -- oh, who the hell am I kidding -- this IS obvious! We paid about $100 for some lady to tell us that it's important to breathe. Excellent. We didn't take the class too seriously. I hope there isn't a test. At one point I made a snide remark to Betsy and she almost lost it laughing in the class at a very quiet moment. Ok, she did lose it in the class. She was trying not to laugh, but literally had to get up and walk out of the room. Well, it was more like run out of the room. As she hit the door, she lost it and let out one of the biggest laughs you can imagine. People in the class weren't sure if she was laughing or crying. I got a lot of strange looks. I thought the teacher might kick us out and send us to the prenatal school principal. Betsy took so long, I left to go find her. I thought she might have laughed so hard that she lost a little bladder control (another nice side-effect of pregnancy). Luckily all was fine and the teacher let us back in for a little more breathing training. Breathe in, breathe out ...

Today Betsy and The Bean had a non-stress-test. This was a first for me. I think we have probably all heard of a stress test, but who has ever heard of a non-stress-test. Basically, Betsy had to lie on a Dr.'s table with two contraptions on the ever-expanding belly. One measures contractions and the other measures The Bean's heart rate. The Bean needed his heart rate to go up and down. This shows that he's moving around and healthy. That's more easily said and done. Apparently The Bean was asleep when the test started. The office has tricks to get babies to move around. They gave Betsy a lollipop, they offered one to me too but in my attempt to be a mature adult worthy of a child, I declined. They also had her drink cold water. But, nothing worked. They threatened that we would have to go to the hospital for monitoring if he didn't move. These were some serious billable hours I was about to lose. I tried talking to him a lot. That didn't work, but sometimes he moves when I told to him. He seems to like football a lot. He always moves during football games (he has seen the Texans twice and lots of other preseason games on TV). He also moves at movies. Betsy was a pseudo-celebrity as we walked out of Knocked Up. What the crowded theater didn't know is that she was so freaked out she was about to break down crying in the car. Note to self, avoid movies about child birth or parenthood until The Bean is born. Neither football nor a movie were possible in the Dr.'s office. What else? Got it, music. Betsy has an iPhone (yes, it's very cool, but that's an entirely different blog). I grabbed the iPhone and put the earphones up to her stomach. It was time for me to play DJ. Unfortunately, the iPhone is filled with chick-music, so it wasn't easy finding music upbeat enough to get The Bean moving. I started off with a little David Bowie. It seemed to wake him up a little. Then I moved on to Jet. There he goes, he's moving a bit. Next, I went to one of my favorites, The Shins. Ah, perfect. We were getting all of the movement and variation in heartbeat that we needed. No trips to the hospital. Plus, we know he has good taste in music. I was dancing along with The Bean in the Dr.'s office. I finished off with a little of The Killers (I wonder if The Bean will ever listen to any of these bands. My guess is the only one that will still be well-known is Bowie). The Dr. came in, gave us a funny look, checked the printout and told us good job.

So that's it. You are up to date. New posts will be shorter and hopefully relatively frequent.

Welcome Post

Welcome to the Adventures of the Bean. I am sure you have 100 questions already. Maybe I can help with a few of those. Here is a quick question and answer session.

Q. Why are you writing this blog?
A. Well, it's not because I think I am particularly witty or interesting or a great writer. Nope, I am writing this blog mostly because Betsy asked me to. You see, we are having a baby and you don't mess with a woman who is nine months pregnant. Those of you who have had kids know this is true. Those who haven't, trust me. She wanted me to start the blog because we have a bunch of people who live out of town and are interested in this whole having a kid thing. So here it is, my blog on having a kid and watching him grow up. By the way, it's a him.

Q. What is your kid's name?
A. I will let you know in about a month when he decides it's time to come join us out here in the real world.

Q. Does anyone know the name?
A. Maybe ... but if anyone does know the name I promise they have been sworn to secrecy and had to pass a strenuous training program that ensures they won't reveal the name without the application of the most sophisticated torture devices. Are any of you torture experts?

Q. What is The Bean?
A. It's just a nickname. Despite the fact that I was a pretty good hippie in college and still firmly believe that I am a hippie on the inside, we did not name our child "Bean". Although, there are plenty of other hippie names that I am not ruling out.

Q. Does he have any other nicknames?
A. He has been called a lot of different things. One of my favorites is what my assistant, Chris, calls him: Roscoe. I might have to reevaluate the name we have picked out.

Q. Why should I read this blog?
A. You should read this blog if you want to know what's going on with Betsy, The Bean, and me. Hopefully, I will update this pretty consistently. Hopefully, it will be mildly entertaining. We will definitely provide links to pictures, video, and anything else we can think of to post. We welcome comments and suggestions. In fact, it would be a fun way to see who is actually reading this if you will comment once in a while. If you don't feel like it, that's fine too. Unfortunately, we are not always great at keeping in touch, hopefully this will make up for that a little bit.

Q. What have I missed so far?
A. I was hoping you would ask that...