First day at UVA

We arrived at 4am. It was the strangest feeling that I cant even describe. I was nauseous walking into the hospital..nerves, just not knowing what to expect. We got up to the NICU and it was very very quiet..they showed us what to do when we come in(calling the desk and their scrubbing procedures) and then took us back to her bed. They explained that they were just trying to keep her stable and keep it very quiet. The charge nurse came over and said we could stay in the room in the back...so we got settled and laid down for a bit and then went and got breakfast. When we got back we talked to Dr Zanelli and different nurses. She told us that Bella was doing better than when she got here but we weren't out of the clear for ECMO. Around 9:30am the DR came and told us that things turned around and they had to do ECMO. We signed a few papers and they told us to go wait in the back room and they would come get us when the surgery was over. At 10:15 they came to talk to us and told us her SATS were back up but they were still going to do ECMO since she was so up and down. During the procedure one of the DRs and one of the nurses kept coming in our room to update us and eventually came to let us know the surgery went well. We were able to go back and see her and what a shock to see so many machines hooked up to our little baby girl.

The rest of the day was just a cycle of standing at her bedside for a little bit, going back to the room and crying, standing by her bedside, back to the room to cry...we were already so emotionally and physically exhausted