Noah’s Story continued

Week 1  
Mum and dad are so worried as I’m a very poorly boy.  I’m on antibiotics, need a platelet transfusion, have a long-line in for intravenous nutrition and a thick tube sucks nasty green stuff out of my stomach.  Oh, and I’m under the lights for jaundice.  
Mum spends hours in the expressing room and makes gallons of milk and some good supportive relationships there.  

Week 2  
Mum and dad learn a bit about patience as they wait for my tummy to settle down.  They’re pleased when a barium meal is normal and I’m allowed 1 ml of breast milk each 4 hours (yum-yum!).  
But that changes when a paediatric surgeon visits and   says he thinks I have Hirschsprung’s disease and may need a colostomy.  
Mum and dad brightly agree to go to Wellington immediately, then mum decides she’s had enough and breaks down, while dad once again goes into panic organisational mode at home.   I just enjoy the ambulance ride! 

Week 3  
I’m back on a ventilator in intensive care as I’ve had a three hour operation removing most of my colon and giving me a colostomy. Mum and dad always said they’d like a holiday away from the other kids, but they don’t seem to be enjoying this one!  
  

Week 4  
Back in Palmy,  I begin to tolerate tube feeds of breast milk.   The great day arrives when my long line is removed and I am taken off the cardiac monitor.  
 Mum keeps picking me up for a cuddle, boasting that she’s got a portable baby!  
  Week 5 and 6  
Another lesson in patience for my parents. They want me to feed, I want to sleep; they want me to gain weight, I’m not bothered!  
Mum starts to think she is a neonatal nurse, learning the routines of the unit, tube-feeding me and caring for my colostomy.  
I get to visit my real home one evening between feeds.  
The brothers and sisters make a big deal of this, fighting over who will hold me and taking photos, but I don’t know what all the fuss is about.  

Week 7  
It holds things up when I develop a wound infection and need intravenous antibiotics, but finally I’m discharged from NNU ,just in time to meet grandma and grandad at the airport.  They’ve flown all the way from England because of me!  
Week 9 
Back to Wellington for more surgery.  It’s hard for mum and dad to let me go back to theatre after I’ve been doing so well and they spend four worried hours drifting around the hospital. 
I recover much more quickly this time and get discharged after a week, able to pooh normally and make some disgusting noises! 
 Week 10 
I give mum a real surprise by learning to breastfeed!  It’s my father’s day present for dad, who will no longer have to give me a bottle of expressed milk in the middle of the night while mum is attached to the pump! 
Mum is so happy that she feeds me whenever I want. I love it, but my teenage brothers get embarrassed! 
 

Age 3 months 
I love being at home with my family. I can smile, I’m fully breast fed and I’m thriving. 
I’m so grateful to everyone who helped get me here. 

The  Beginning! 

It’s good to know that although I’m small,  
I matter so much.