Welcome Home!

After a long three days, Delton and Mom were both discharged this afternoon and came home. Since Friday morning’s rough start, Delton has been doing wonderfully and looks healthy and gorgeous. His test results for a bacteria infection came back negative and he’s maintained his blood sugar level, body temperature and heart rate and blood pressure.

By Saturday morning, he was able to go off his IV and was consistently feeding with Dianne throughout the day.Saturday afternoon, following a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Carmony, he was able to leave the special care nursery and join us in our room, where he remained for the rest of our stay.

Today (Sunday) was discharge day for both Delton and Mom. After spending most of the morning on final checkups, paperwork and Q and A’s with the nursery doctor and staff, we headed home. The afternoon was spent with Dianne catching up on some sleep while Delton and I watched football and he napped. He’s quickly settling into his routine, and it’s wonderful to be home and have the full extent of our baby supplies, clothes, etc., available to use and to simply be home in comfortable, welcoming environment.

This coming week should be an eventful one for Delton, including his first appointment with his pediatrician, visits from lots of friends and family, as well as his introduction to the family dogs, Tobey and Maddie, who return from their kennel stay Monday afternoon.

Lots of firsts, and lots of photos and video to come!

Snuggling with Mom

Just before his first successful feeding, Delton spent some time snuggling with his mom this evening.

Snuggling with Mom from Tom Carmony on Vimeo.

Introducing Delton Thomas Carmony

After 29 long hours of labor, our beautiful baby boy, Delton Thomas Carmony made his grand entrance at 7:19am today, Friday, October 5th. Dianne was tremendous, working through more than three hours of pushing to get the little guy out. His final exit was aided a bit by a vacuum suction cup to the noggin (much like the “toilet plunger” Dianne always jokingly threatened to self-employ if he stayed too far beyond his due date) to cover those final precious few inches.

He was a bit “out of it” initially, probably due to a combination of the long labor and tough exit, as well as the amount of pain meds administered to mom throughout the whole process. As the initial minutes passed, though, he began to perk up and become more responsive to the pokes and prods of the nursing staff. He was popped on the scale and measured eight pounds and 20 inches in length.

Because of his slow start, along with the long period of time between Dianne’s water breaking and Delton’s birth (29 hours), it was decided that he’d move over to the Special Care Nursery for some testing and observations. The toughest part was watching the little guy get pricked for blood tests and have an IV inserted (primarily to give him sugar if needed, as there was some concern about his blood sugar levels right after birth). He proved to be quite the trooper though, as he clearly reacted to everything, but wasn’t overly fussy about it.

As Day One progressed, he was looking better each time we checked in on him. By mid-morning, his color was great, blood sugar was good and all the vitals were looking strong. One of the staff’s concerns was that he may have been exposed to bacteria, due to the long period of time between the water breaking and delivery. The standard here at Group Health’s Family Beginnings is 18 hours as the cutoff for concern over bacteria/infection exposure. Because of the length of Delton’s journey (29 hours), they administered a couple different blood tests for various infections, all of which (thus far) have come back negative.

By evening, Dianne was able sit down with Delton in the nursery and start working on breastfeeding. Their initial foray didn’t lead to much, but a second go-round roughly two hours later hit the jackpot; he latched on and fed for roughly 15 minutes. A third evening session netted 30+ minutes on the breast. Yes, Delton is indeed apparently a “breast man.”

Overall, here at the end of a spectacular day and an exhausting last 48 hours, we’re thrilled to be getting to know this new addition to our family. He’s already amazing us with his physical strength (including the ability to turn his head when he’s laying against one of our chests), his inquisitiveness and his laid-back attitude. We’re just so incredibly thrilled to be starting this journey with him!