I discovered an uncomfortable truth when we had to monitor DS's oxygen levels overnight and found they could get pretty bad. I'm not over his birth and the following NICU experience and may not ever be.
Journalling~
When I took Marcus to see the ENT to have his grommets checked last month, I asked about his sleeping, which is very poor. He snores like a train, has small apneas when he sleeps and is constantly tired.
The doctor looked down his throat and said his tonsils were big and that he wanted to have his oxygen levels checked while he slept. So today Dave picked up a portable oximeter from Starship Children's Hospital and we've just put it on him and connected it all up.
Within about 2 minutes of falling asleep Marcus was snoring and within 10 he had his first apnea. The monitor promptly dropped to 85% and the alarm went off. Dave has just turned the sound off so that it doesn't beep through the night and wake him up. (He's sleeping in our bed in an attempt to avoid midnight excursions so it'll wake me too - poor Dave has been relegated to the couch or the spare bed, whichever he chooses.) I immediately snapped back into the NICU and SCBU mindset I thought I'd left behind. I was super conscious of his breathing and every time he had an apnea I had to resist the urge to check the numbers (which Dave told me were dropping, getting as low as 71%) and poke him to make him breathe again as we did when he was a baby.
I'm back in that hypersensitive state and I suspect I'll stay that way all night. I'm going to take a sleeping pill to make sure I sleep or I won't be any good to anyone tomorrow.
Right now, I've gone back out to the lounge to let him sleep, or I'll lie there and worry. I'm writing this with my stomach tied in knots and all those bad feelings are back. Which is really quite silly - this will have been going on for ages and because I didn't know I didn't worry about it. But now I know. And now I'm worrying. I feel quite sick about it - literally.
I guess he'll be having his tonsils out. The ENT said that if his oxygen levels were being affected, that's
what they would have to do.
This hurts. I had rather suspected this result, and thought it was all okay. Now it's happening, I don't feel okay about it at all. Not one tiny, little bit.
Credits~
Background paper, button, star and alpha from "Funky" in the "Back in Black" collection by Amanda Rockwell; journalling paper and envelope from "Bright" in the "Back in Black" collection by Amanda Rockwell; tie-down from "Fun" in the "Back in Black" collection by Amanda Rockwell; felt swirl from "Fresh" in the "Back in Black" collection by Amanda Rockwell; stitching from "Fab" in the "Back in Black" collection by Amanda Rockwell; cardboard tear from "Cardboard Flip and Tear" by LindaGB; fonts are KGD Kirsty Script and Kingthing Typewriter.
