On Daddy's Watch

From 11:00 PM to 5:00 AM is daddy time! I get to clean and feed Will and tend to his every need. Now typically I tend to be a bit of night owl; one of the great gifts of working full-time while going through school a tad more than full-time, so these hours are quite acceptable for me. Lately however Will has really started to like staying up ALL NIGHT with daddy! He usually stays asleep from 11:30 'til 12:15 AM which leaves the balance of the time up to my expert abilities to goof around with my boy and become a bit psychotic from sleep deprivation.

A little needy are we Bella?

Lola Bella has been adapting pretty well to her new brother and is mostly scared to death of him. We have been watching her every move just to be careful and she is still unsure of the newest addition to our family. She will sniff and sniff William and get pretty close until he decides to stretch and move and then she jumps back and hides. She is so sweet and gets really concerned when he cries though and watches with intent while we hustle about calming him down. Bella is feeling a little neglected though and is constantly climbing on our laps while we are holding Will. I am sure it is funny to see with both Will and Bella in our lap! Even though she is scared she has to always be touching me or Mike.

Tough Guy, Ehh?

So Will has decided he no longer needs to wear his O2 in his nose and every time I turn around he is wearing it some other way. It is so funny to see how much he hates it and watch him find ways to pull it off. The other morning he had pulled it off and was wearing it as a necklace, it was awesome. My personal fav is the Vampire look!
I have even triple taped it down, yes I said TRIPLE taped it down and he still manages to get it off somehow. In this pic he is asleep, holding it out of his nose! You can see his little cheek is being pulled by all the tape but apparently it’s better than having the O2 in his nose. .
I guess we are both counting down the days until he no longer needs it!

William Came Home!

We are so excited to let everyone know that William came home around 11 am yesterday! It was the perfect birthday present even if it was a day late. He is still on his oxygen but they were able to send us home with a whole system to take care of him. Its actually pretty cool and not as intimidating as I was imaging it would be. Right now we have a small travel tank and monitor that we can take anywhere and they will be bringing a big stationary system for the house. Its nice because it alarms us when is breathing isn't right so we don't have to constantly be worrying if he is breathing ok. We are so happy to have him home! His first night was really good and he is such a sweetie! He is still eating really good and a pretty mellow baby so far. He has an amazing ability to pee on me pretty much every time I change his diaper though! As for visiting William the doctors told us to be extra cautious still so please be patient everyone. We promise you can meet him as soon as he is ready!

Will

Here are some updated pics. We cant believe Will is already 2 weeks old today!

Our Baby Shower

Here are a few pics from our fun baby shower! Who knew that 4 days later little William would decide to make his grand entrance into the world! We had so much fun and had so much support from all of our friends and family. Thanks to Stacy and Whitni for all the small details, we loved it!

More Oxygen Please!

Since our last post Will is back on oxygen. It was literally the next day they had to put him back on. He is still just trying to completely develop his little lungs and it is hard to go in every day and see him still needing it. The doctor this morning was saying they might consider sending him home on it if he still needs it after he has everything else ready to go. This scares me like crazy! As if being new parents we aren't scared enough already!! But we know he still has a long way to go before they even consider this. Good news though, Will has started nursing! They moved him to a Stage 2 feeding (this is good) which means he gets to nurse every 6 hours instead of just receiving his food through his tube every time. This also means lots of time in Mommy's arms!! He is also completely off of his IV and putting on weight. I have decided for every ounce he gains I should automatically loose a pound, wouldn't that be nice! He gets to wear clothes now and he looks so dang cute in them. Will is also a little flirt and has many of the nurses switching assignments so they can take care of him. We love it! All in all things are going good and we look forward to the little improvements and strengths Will makes every day.
Thanks for all the love and support!
Jamie

The Blog Lady

Many of you probably experienced the same thing I did in my hometown. We had a bag lady. The bag lady was of course crazy and had lots and lots of, well, bags. My bag lady actually had a coat made out of bags which I imagine was quite nice during the monsoon season in Utah (next Friday afternoon from 2:00 PM to 2:12 PM, watch out all you in the area). As Jamie and I use our reusable grocery bags (courtesy of Trader Joes) I wonder what today's bag ladies will do when their bags disappear? Quite disconcerting! Anyway the bag lady came to mind after I decided on the title of this entry. Such a person should in no way be thought to be what I am comparing my wife to; rather just a trite introduction to my wife's diligent efforts at keeping our blog safe and sound!

As we were waiting to visit Will at 8:00 PM tonight Jamie and I were updating the blog. I feel sorry for some of you who feel obligated to read each of my inane updates, however; I am completely enthralled with being a Daddy! Jamie has decided my role is to be the creative "dork" for the blog and she will proof read. These pictures were taken as she was enjoying the recent slide show of Sir William. I thought she looked absolutely gorgeous, and even more so when you realize she had just given birth. Regardless, she always looks amazing!

No O2 for You!

As some of you may know Jamie and I have been enjoying a crazy schedule of every three hours we either rush to the hospital or pump... ok so Jamie has been enjoying a crazy schedule! Anyway one of the results of this schedule is that it seems like weeks since William joined us because we come and go from the hospital so often. Our usual hospital attendance is: 8 AM, 2 PM, 5 PM, 8 PM & 11 PM. All shifts (except 2 AM, 5 AM, 11 AM). We go home in between and run some errands before returning. 8 PM & 11 PM usually allows us to sit in the cafeteria and work on some of the things outstanding. Jamie actually accomplishes things; I sit here and look at pictures of Will. I should of course be studying for my finals, but why right? :) Ok, so back to the point.

At our 5:00 PM session tonight we walked in and noticed Will didn't have any O2 flowing through his little nose pipes! We asked the nurse and she said he'd been off the air for the past few hours and was doing really well! They hadn't increased his O2 percentage beyond standard 21% we all breath, but Will has needed a bit of pressure to keep him breathing normal. Things appear fine now though; let’s hope he keeps it up! Additionally it had been about 18 hours since his last BM. When we left in the morning they were going to give him a suppository, luckily they couldn't find one and when they were finally ready to give it to him he had a surprise waiting. The nurses laughed at how heavy his diaper was. It's nice to know our boy is efficient and decides that why poop all day when you can have one massive diaper! He must get that efficiency trait from his mom.

So in summary he is progressing VERY WELL. He still needs to get rid of a bit of jaundice and they want to make sure he can start actually eating (he is fed through a tube presently) but otherwise is doing awesome.

Below is a little slide show I threw together from our morning visit. As Jamie would talk to Will he would respond amazingly well! His facial expressions tell it all! He would smile, look bewildered, and finally when mom got quiet he put his hand by his ear for her to speak up! Hope you all enjoy it!

Addresses

I am trying to get ahead and caught up on a bunch of things before Will comes home and it would really help if everyone would send me an email with their home addresses. Even if you think I have it, please send it to me again! Thanks!

jamie_leigh_21@hotmail.com

I Love You Mommy!

So yesterday while Jamie and I were hanging out with Will, Jamie started talking to him and sure enough I looked over to him using his only known word in American Sign Language:

Yeah he loves his mommy!

Our Handsome Little Guy

Let me first say thanks for all the love and support we have felt the past few days. It is hard to believe it has only been 3 short days since our little guy decided to come, it feels like weeks have passed. We are so lucky to have such amazing friends and family that are there for us. We apologize for any unreturned calls, texts, or hurt feelings the past couple of days have been crazy. Lets get to the good stuff though!!

Mike has been amazing at updating the blog but he is missing a few of the specifics. William Garrett Scott (or Will for short) joined us on Wednesday April 30th at 4:14 PM. He weighed 6lbs 6ozs and is 19 1/2 inches long which is not bad at all for 5 weeks early! He is the most handsome little guy I have ever seen in my life!!! His personality is already well established and all the nurses love giving us his updates. He is very social and loves attention and being touched. When ever he gets fussy he often calms himself by rubbing his hands on his face (if you remember the ultra sound he has loved putting his hands in front of his face from the beginning) and loves to squirm around all the time! We finally get to hold him again and Will loves being held and cuddled and definitely gets this from his mommy. He also absolutely hates all his breathing and feeding tubes and pulls them out multiple times a day. The nurses have tried everything and he still manages to get them out somehow! I think he must get this from his daddy :)

It has been really hard to leave him at the hospital (I came home Thursday night) but we know he needs to get a lot stronger before he can come home. The nurses at LDS are awesome and include us in so much though. Our favorite is what the Special Needs Nursery calls CARES. Every three hours we get to go and help take care of his daily needs. We get to change his diaper, check his temperature, feed him, and brush his hair. This is also when we get to hold him. It is my favorite part of the day and I look forward to every second I get to feel like more apart of his life. Will loves his dark thick hair getting brushed and is content to be in our arms. I look forward to him being healthy and being able to come home. It is rough but I am so thankful for Mike and his strength.

I promise to call when things settle down and we get him home so please don't get offended. For now the best way to keep update is our blog. We love you all so much!

Doing Better! (Updated)

*** Just added some new photos to the slide show below this afternoon***
So we just stopped in this morning to check in on William. He is doing much better! They decided he didn't need the all the extra gadgets hooked up and his breathing has stabelized. Jamie will add a bit in a minute, I just wanted to add some photos.



Feel free to click on the slideshow to see the photos one by one on Picasa.

What happened to my calendar!?

Anyone who has either worked or gone to school with me (or even tried to hang out) knows that my life is run through my outlook calendar. If it's not on there, I won't remember it and you will be enjoying a nice big burger at Squattersall by yourself! For some reason nobody told our child that!

So at 3:15 AM on April the 30th little William Garrett Scott decided he wanted to start his long trek out to see the world! I guess William didn't understand he was supposed to wait until June 1st to begin his quest. Jamie woke me a little while later around 5:00 AM to tell me we needed to go to the hospital because it appeared her water had broken. I will spare you a lot of the details involved, however; suffice it to say we both imagined we could just get this fixed and wait a few more weeks. Upon arrival and check in (me in my stellar Board Shorts & Flip Flops) they informed us that today we would be having a baby. Shock and awe are really the only words to describe it. We knew William had been developing well beyond what he was supposed to; but still 5 weeks early couldn't be good!

From 6:00 AM to about 12:30 PM Jamie endured a lot of pain as the doctors pumped her full of meds and her contractions began. A few hours later she finally received an epidural which was the best feeling I have ever experienced. I know it sounds bizarre but watching the love of your life writhe in such pain, and being completely worthless to help, nothing more than a place holder or a freshly misted fern, it really helped me. Jamie quickly went through all of the necessary steps and the doctor was alerted she was ready to go! After a few minutes of pushing William came out screaming and squirming about.

The nurses immediately took him away to be examined with my in accompaniment. He was doing awesome for 5 weeks early, but still was not perfect. After a few minutes his breathing was ok and we enjoyed seeing him, holding him, and playing with him. After being shuffled to our new room William's breathing worsened. We notified the nursery and they took him away to begin running tests. While anything I could experience pales to what my wife had just endured the ensuing hours were torturous. My wife unfortunately watched me weep uncontrollably for hours, unable to speak with a literal lump in my throat. I couldn't swallow. Jamie would ask what I was thinking and what was wrong, I could not speak because I would inevitably begin wailing! We decided to pray together and not a word left my mouth. For the first time in my life I literally could not speak. For a successful salesperson and arrogant son of gun, this is quite amazing! But such was my pain out of the fear of what awaited my son.

The longest night of my life was spent watching my wife recover and pacing outside the special needs nursery hoping my son would be fine. Luckily the cot was so comfy I slept plenty! When morning broke and our pediatrician arrived we had good news. William had fought hard to become self sufficient and had improved tremendously. He was nowhere near coming home with us but he was no longer in immediately danger as he had been. The remainder of the day we continued to check in on our little guy and watch in amazement as Jamie recovered with absolutely no medication. What woman endures labor and just asks for a single Alieve? I guess living with me for nearly four years has built up her resistance to pain!

Mommy and baby are doing well; dad's kind of in a daze but so happy things have turned out great!