Fight Night for Zoey Written Jan 15, 2013 12:27am

Got to Rochester, got checked in at RMH, met the awesome people that work here & got over to the NICU. When we got there there was a bit of commotion around Zoey. We knew something was up so Sally went & pumped & I went back after setting her up in the pump room. Zoey had either spit up her breathing tube or it had slid out. She proceeded to breath fairly well apparently on her own so they decided to put her on the c-pap machine, which would be well ahead of schedule & her next progression. The docs were encouraged & let her run on the machine for 45 minutes & we anxiously awaited the results for her CO2 suppression & how much oxygen she needed to keep safe levels. Unfortunately they weren't comfortable with her results & decided to put the breathing tube back in which meant intubating her again. I made the beyond regrettable decision to watch her being intubated. Not only did she turn horribly blue & look the worst I've ever seen her, she also rejected the tube & fought gagging it out with everything she had. I can't even describe how bad of an idea it was for me to watch this & I can't begin to properly put it into words. This process drug on for what felt like an eternity and was time for Sally to pump again, so there's your time frame for how long this took. I left & brought Sally to the pump room & went to the family room to relax & try not to freak out. We got done with Sally's pumping & went back in as they had finished up. We found out that Zoey went up 2 sizes of tubes before she took the tube & calmed down. Docs reassured us that she handled it all well as all her levels had returned to stable. Just a reminder of what the steps had told us; for every 2 steps forward there may & will be a step back at times. Just an awful reminder of that truth as she had been doing so well since she got there. We put up a "Milestone" calendar for us/nurses to write on for when anything significant happened so we had a timeline for us to look back on & appreciate the battle that Zoey is going through & fighting for so much.