Our baby's done got the jaundice!

As many of you may know, Conner was born big and healthy. After we brought him home though, he lost 19oz. He was very sleepy and it was hard to keep him awake to feed. At his first Dr. visit, we were sent to have blood work done at the hospital. We also needed to start feeding him formula between breast feeding sessions to help get his weight back up. The next day the nurse called to tell Anne he was negative for jaundice. Anne was a bit confused and asked if that seemed right. At this point Conner looked like an Oompa-Loompa.


The nurse asked the Dr. what he thought. He was not convinced by the lab work and had us return to do the test again. And yes, the first test was wrong.

Photo by Jonathan Shaw 09

Apparently his "count" was 16. Anything above 10 required UV treatment and anything above 20 was a hospital stay. We were given an in-house treatment known as the billy blanket. It was a machine that plugged into the wall, then had a thick cord attached to a glowing pad. Conner had to have it on 24-7 and it needed to be rotated front to back every two hours. This wasn't that hard as he needed to feed every two hours.

Our little glow worm. MSW 3/09

In addition to being swaddled up with this glowing thing, he had to wear these foam goggles to protect his eyes. That was the hardest part of the whole thing. He couldn't see for two days.

Why so sad Batman? MSW 3/09

I must admit though, he definitely looked the part of a son who's dad watches too much Scifi. He was glowing with goggles, with a cord running from him to this big machine...it was more comical than scary. In two days his color was normal and his apatite returned.

Anne and I were a little disappointed for him. We thought he may be olive complected like his grandfathers, but instead he is pasty and pale like his parents! We better buy stock in sunscreen.