Week 1 Part 2:

It has been a long few days with this little trooper.   Lonnie and I have spent all the time we can with him and still care for our 2 girls.   I was lucky enough to be able to stay at the hospital over night for the first week he was there.  It was hard not to be home, but I felt so torn not to be with our little angel, as well.  There is no real way to explain this unless you have had a baby in the NICU.
Lonnie would go home when he felt like he could and spend time with the girls.  I went home for a few hours toward the end of the week to see them as well.  We have amazing family and friends and were able to have the girls stay with others most of the time Bransen was in the NICU.

We were able to snuggle with the little guy and hold him on day 2 it was almost scary to hold him but so comforting at the same time.  He had all sorts of wires and tubes attached to him that you would basically not move once the nurse handed him to you.  I became more and more comfortable with holding him, but it took time.


While Bransen was in the NICU we had every nurse that walked by him and everyone that was attending to his needs ask, where did he get that blonde hair?  At first I didn't have an answer for this, but later we learned there were 2 reasons.  One is my brother Jordan... he looked just like him when he was born!!  Not only did everyone fall in love with his full head of hair but it was such a different color as well.  The other thing that all the nurses noticed was that he was so light complected, they would turn on the lights and ask if he seemed to be breathing okay.


Dr. Brown was so good to help all of us get through this time of change and unknown.  We were still trying to figure out why he couldn't keep his sugars stable on his own, they were talking about putting him on a medicine that would help this, but he would need to be weened off of at one point.  This would post-pone his going home.  Also they were trying to figure out why he wasn't able to figure out taking a bottle.  I was trying to pump and help him get the nutrition he needed but not be able to breast feed.  He had to supplement 3/4 of his feeds with fortified milk and formula.  He was struggling trying to figure out a balance to sleep just like any newborn does, but he was so tight in his muscles that they were concerned with this because he wouldn't relax very easily in just anyone's arms.  They had him on pain meds to relax him for this.  He usually would for me or Lonnie, but the doctors wanted to see what was going on.

I came down to visit him around 1 am on Monday night, I think it was, so he was 3 days old.  There were at least 4 nurses standing around him with gloves on and I was shocked and asked what happened.  They said oh nothing he just lost his IV so we are putting one in his head.....  At this point I was already so emotional with everything and hormones that I just started crying.  The nurses just looked at me and then one of them came over to me with tissues and asked if there was anything they could do.  I tried to ask why they were doing that, but I couldn't get it out.  I just turned and started walking away.  I don't think they wanted to leave me alone at this point.  I stopped and said to the poor nurse that was helping me to the door.  I promise I will be fine.  This is the 2nd real cry I have had since he was born, I'm pretty sure this was a long time coming and I just need to get it out.  She understood.  Any mother would understand this after just having a baby!!!  I called Lonnie and he just didn't know what to do to help me.  I said I just needed to talk to him.  I think he was in a panic because he wasn't with me and he didn't know what he could do with my hormones running wild and our little one being tortured downstairs....or so it seemed to his mother for that matter.  I know, I know it is routine and he was fine, but how scary to see such a big IV being put into my child's head... It was so hard, I will just say that.... if I could have taken his place I so would have!!!

Bransen's Week 1 - Part 1:

This was one of the hardest weeks I have ever had to endure.  Lonnie and I not only had to cope emotionally with just having our 3rd child, our 1st boy, and all of his struggles.  But, we also have 2 little ones at home that need us as well.  I have never felt soo torn.  The girls stayed with my parents for the first few nights.  They came up to visit me in the hospital fully expecting to see their new baby brother Bransen.




My parents gave each of us a little stuffed animal when a new sibling was born and said it was from them.  I still have my care bear that they gave me and said it was from Jordan. So I started this tradition from Bransen.  My dad gave Kennadee a big cuddly gorilla when Rylee was born.  They were so excited to be able to come in the room to see Lonnie and I.  Kennadee didn't understand why she couldn't see Bransen and hold him,  Rylee was just happy!

That first night was really hard we went down and spent most of our time with Bransen.  All we could do was hold his little hand though.



It was really hard not to cry every time I looked at our little angel!  He was so tiny and he looked so fragile with all of the tubes and wires hooked to him.

He was on a CPAP to help him breath and a warming cap for his brain.  He was being monitored for everything, his heart, his breathing, his oxygen levels, He was also being tube fed.  His glucose levels where still not under control, at this point, so he was still having little sudden jerks of his whole body.  They said they weren't seizures, but we later found out more than likely they actually were.  He was also needing his blood sugar levels checked ever 30 minutes to an hour, his poor little feet were pin cushions :(   It was also really hard not to see his little face.  The IV in his hand, as you can see, is bigger than his hand.  He kept having to have this moved and re done at least once a day.

All we could do was watch and pray that he would be okay soon.

2016 #bransenstrong Our Journey with our little Angel!

I am going to try and use this resource to jot down my feelings about all that we have been through and will continue to go through.  We have been blessed with a beautiful baby boy, or as our 4 year old would say "handsome Mom, he's handsome!"  He is now 7 months old officially on Tuesday.

I want to use this space to write our story and especially his.... I feel this will bless me and may also touch others along the way.

He as given me many reasons to smile and will always be my smile!  I will try and start from the beginning of his story the best I can put it together.  This little guy has been through a lot in his short little life so far.

Birth story:

Bransen Grant Charlton  was born 3 weeks early on June 19th, 2015.  He was 5 lbs 4 oz.  and 17.5 inches long.  This came as a shock to us, that he was so little,  both our girls were born about 3 weeks early as well and were 7 lbs.  I wasn't worried at all about him except that he moved sooo much during the last trimester.  I went into my 37 week check and was going to have my membranes stripped because I was getting to the point I couldn't handle it anymore.  It was also about the time I went into labor with my other kids anyway.  I left the appointment and went back to work and actually felt better rather than worse.  I was disappointed because I figured it didn't work.  Well by 7 that evening I started having the contractions and they progressed until we went in at about 5am.  I was dilated to a 3+ but was progressing very quickly with the timing of the contractions and the pain.

 Within the hour they had put me in a room and I had my epidural. When I was trying to relax during the labor process my sweet sister-in-law Lori was by my side watching all the stats to make sure everything was going OK.  She seemed concerned with Bransen's vitals, not only did his vitals drop when I had a contraction but it also seemed like every time he moved they dropped as well.  I was becoming uneasy but she assured me that he was fine and they weren't dropping enough to be concerned, yet.  I was only in labor for a short time when Dr. Blackett came in and said I was hoping to see you today.  She checked me and said she would be back in about an hour to break my water and get things started.  The nurses were becoming more and more concerned with the vitals.  When Dr. Blackett did break my water they hurried the process along as best they could.  When it finally came time to push they had a whole team of people in the room.  I wasn't really in tune enough to notice how many were in the room until after the fact.  I pushed several times and it seemed like I couldn't push any harder.  I was asked to give one last good push and Dr Blackett had to helped pull his shoulder out, the cord was wrapped around his neck 3 times and was tightening with every push, she had to cut the cord mid-delivery.   When he finally arrived, she set him on me and within a second I could tell that something was wrong,  he was grey in color and was not breathing correctly.  They immediately rushed him to the corner of the room and the respiratory experts worked on him for about 15 minutes.

I kept asking if he was okay, sweet Dr. Blackett stayed within my line of sight to reassure me that everything was going to be okay.  She didn't have to do that but she helped me through that 15 minutes so I wouldn't have a panic attack.  Lonnie stayed as close to Bransen as he could.  They finally brought him over to us so that I could hold him again and as we were loving on him the respiratory nurse said he is losing his color again we need to take him.  They rushed him to the NICU and Lonnie went with him.  I was taken care of and was moved to another room and about 1 hour later I was able to go see Bransen again.

I cannot express fully the overwhelming feeling of helplessness, worry, fear, shock, sadness, love, fear again.  That went through me the moment I laid eyes on our precious baby boy.  He was covered in so many wires and tubes, you couldn't even see his face, he was so tiny.  I just sobbed, I watched him and every 30 seconds or so he was having little tremors and I was completely taken over by my sobs at that point.  They told us that he was doing OK on the oxygen he was getting,  They said the tremors are little seizures from low blood sugar.  They were giving him things for this and also looking into what the cause might have been.  The Dr.'s stated that this could be from the placenta not functioning properly, the umbilical cord was as thin and as yellow as straw.  They are not sure how long Bransen went with this.  I just noticed that he was moving a lot, but that seem to me now that maybe he was struggling.  But no one knew for sure.  We were told that if he hadn't come when he did he may not have made it.  He was almost taken to McKay Dee by life flight because of his blood gases.  But they were good enough he didn't need to.  At this point we were so overwhelmed and exhausted and just praying in our hearts that this little boy would be a fighter!