Return of the Rockstar

We got home from the hospital on Saturday, May 7th. With the last two kids we've had problems with Blood Incompatibilty Jaundice where because the kids blood type and my blood type happen to be the most incompatible their liver can't get rid of the excess bilirubin fast enough--causing jauncice to set in. With Brett, he was borderline having to stay an extra day in the hospital but his number was low enough that they let us go home. After his check up on Monday, our pediatrician wanted another heel stick done to check his bili count. This poor baby had major holes on his heels from all the sticks! Anyway, Monday night the pediatrician on-call called to tell us Brett needed to go back to the hospital for Phototherapy. He made it sound urgent (Scott was now out of town with his Lily Training) so Dad followed me to Carden Children's Hospital and helped Brett and I get checked in.

I am not embarrassed to say I enjoy the perks from being Dad's daughter. It turned out that the neonatologist group that was on-call comprised of several doctors that Dad knew and of course they all loved Dad. Needless to say, Brett and I were well taken care of. All the nurses were impressed by the irony of our Baby Rockstar's name and laughed when I told them the story of it's creation.


I knew it was a good omen when Dad and I walked down a hallway and found that Rockstar Alice Cooper was a financial contributor to the Children's Hospital! Our Rockstar was in good company!


Here, Baby Brett is chillin' in his private "tanning bed." Really he just wanted to get a jump start on his tan for our upcoming trip to Hawaii.

I lived on the US 60 for a couple of days going back and forth from the hospital to home trying to stay on Brett's feeding schedule and be home to be with the other kids. Mom held down the fort with Brock while I was on the road. Who knew being the Mom of a Rockstar would be so demanding!


On Wednesday, Brett was moved from the "B" pod to the "G" pod (irony--we laugh again!) where they anticipated he would finish his last phototherapy sessions and be released. As I drove to the hospital that morning I heard Donny Osmond on 99 KEZ saying he and Marie were here in the valley and signing CD's and such at a Wal-Mart which actually was really close to the hospital! I called Mom on my way and told her "My Donny" was here in Mesa and I knew it was going to be a Great Day! If only I'd had my CD with me . . .


Brett's color changed dramatically to a beautiful piggy pink after the phototherapy. The last test results (another heel stick--ouch!) came back at 6pm Wednesday night saying his bili count was at 10. When we checked in the hospital Monday night it was 16. It dropped as low as 8 (the lower the better) after his last session under the lights but rose a little because they wanted to see what the progress would be with the lights off . 10 was good enough to get us home and I was more than grateful to bring my baby home--again! He was a good boy while we were there and all the nurses loved him! Must be something with the name. . .