The Aftermath

Ben during his EEG.

Unfortunately our stay in the hospital was not without some difficulty. Although both boys scored 9 out of 9 on their Apgar scores they had some difficulty the day after their birth. I noticed that both boys were shaking on and off through the first morning. It looked like they were shivering from being cold. I asked the nurse about it and she assured me it was probably just newborn jitters. I accepted that and sent the twins to the nursery for the night.

My night nurse woke me for what I thought was the first feeding to inform me that they had been observing the boys and they found that when they would shake their oxygen levels would dip and their lips would turn purple/blue. This indicated some sort of problem and they had sent orders for Ben and Sam to be moved to the Special Care floor for more observations and tests.

We went with the boys to their new room and the tests started immediately. They took blood, put in IVs (no more breast-feeding for now), hooked the boys up to monitors, started them on anitbiotics in case of an infection and ordered more tests. The cardiologist came in next and did an ecocardiogram and EKG. Thankfully, their hearts were perfect and we were able to rule out any sort of heart malfunction. The nuerologist was next with an EEG. The results showed that there had been abnormal discharges in the brains of both boys indicating seizure activity. It was a scary moment when we recieved the news. We were not able to talk to the nuerologist right away and we did not know if their had been any damage to the boys' brains or what might be causing the problem.

In the mean time Ben and Sam were moved to the NICU and given spinal taps. The next morning they each had an MRI. They were troopers and slept through both tests. The spinal tap showed no infection and normal blood counts. We were pretty terrified to get the results back from the MRIs. We had been told that there could be blood on the brain, brain swelling, or any other number of reasons causing the seizures. And although the doctors were optimistic that there was probably not much damage done to their brains, we were mentally preparing for the worst.

Thankfully the MRI came back normal. Perfect brains. I can not tell you what a relief and blessing it was to hear this good news. Even though we didn't have an answer as to why Ben and Sam had problems, everything looked great physically. 

So the boys were taken back to Special Care and started a regiment of anti-seizure medicine. They were monitored for a few days and then moved with me to a mother/baby room to transition. We spent a day there and were finally discharged.

Sam and Ben will take their medication for 6 weeks when we will visit the neurologist again for follow up EEGs. If the test are normal and show no indication of seizure activity in the brain, we will wean the boys off the medicine. They were also sent home with monitors to track their breathing and heart-rates which will be kept on for 4 weeks.

So far, neither Ben or Sam has had any episodes or indication of trouble. They have both gained back their birth weight plus some and are nursing almost exclusively again. We were blessed with many family and friends who were praying and fasting for the boys and our family. I have no doubt they were blessed by the faith of those prayers. They also received special blessings from Jeff and our bishop.

Feeding the boys in Special Care

Cute Ben.

Cute Sam.