Prior to Baby D being born, we had been asked by my OB if we planned to have him circumcised. Not for religious reasons at all (although I am half Jewish), I did state that we were looking to have it done. As it got closer to my due date, we discussed it again as well as how the procedure would take place in the hospital and so forth. The NICU as you know, was a total surprise and not something we had planned on, especially for a 2 week stint. He had been born with some fluid in his lungs, which he recovered on his own and had one slight enlarged kidney that was/is being monitored by a nephrologist. The kidney I was aware of while he was in utero, so this was not a shock in the least and a conversation I was prepared for. A couple of days into our NICU stay we inquired about the circumcision. It had been told to us that while monitoring the kidney, the circumcision would be put on hold (giggle). Several days after that and a day or two before his release, we were given the information that we would make an appointment with the nephrologist for a follow-up and that he more than likely would be performing the circumcision that day in his office. We made the appointment as told and saw the nephrologist who confirmed the slightly enlarged kidney was still slightly enlarged and we would need to make an appointment for an ultrasound and a follow-up appointment with him. When he asked about the circumcision...again..he told us that there was no reason not to get it down and to ask our pediatrician for a referral.
Ummm....we had been out of the hospital for about 6 weeks now, when we initially made the appointment with the nephrologist, we had inquired about the circumcision and NOW you are telling us to talk to our pediatirician who we see every week like clockwork and now HE is the gatekeeper for this procedure and you have no idea why we were not cleared sooner. Simply put, the NICU was told by YOU to wait until after release, they were all a go there ::sigh:: I have said this countless times before, but you are your own advocate, do not be afraid to ask questions and ask multiple people. So again, we make another appointment/consultation which we attend with a nurse practitioner for the pediatric urologist and although VERY informative, she works for a peds office and one would not know it, as she could have been slightly more friendly and not so glare-y when my child was getting miffed about about being poked and prodded by cold hands. We then got a slightly judgy conversation about how circumcisions are supposed to happen within 40 days of life and we are cutting it VERY close, like has to be done in the next week close or not at all and that's if the doctor will still perform it...yadda yadda yadda...
Did I mention the larger than life vintage circus clown poster in the room? Positively terrifying and I had to reposition my chair so as to not look at it...which I am sure Judy McJudgerson was all over...anywhoooo...
Once AGAIN, I have to explain the circumstances and that I wasn't at the tanning booth getting my tan on, that we asked numerous times when we could do this and apparently there was a chain of command that wasn't really a chain at all. Luckily, they squeezed us in for the procedure at a hospital that is about an hour away, but with us working against the clock, it was 100% worth it. We then got a very detailed description of the procedure, where hubs quite noticeably paled and then asked if one of us gets to be in there during the procedure. He got pale at the description, can you just imagine if he was in there for the real thing? I am pretty sure I would be in another part of the hospital with my passed out husband and some type of smelling salts trying to revive him.
Our appointment was scheduled for a couple days after and because the doctor was described as "THE" guy to go too, we trekked down to Miami which considering the short window of time we were working with #worthit. We were instructed that the Baby D could not eat an hour before and with a newborn (can one still be a newborn at 2 months...is that an infant...cue shrugging girl emoji) who eats like clockwork every three hours, timing was going to be of the essence. So we get down to Miami (mom is watching EV), check in (we did all the preliminary information over the phone to make it easy) and get called pretty quickly. I am assuming with newborns not being able to eat an hour before, they are pretty swift with their timelines. Because Hurricane Dorian was on the horizon, weather had been pretty splotchy in Florida or at least moreso than usual so the rain was pretty intense by the time we arrived which leads us to while we were waiting for the doctor in the examination room, an electrical surge happened and all the lights (with the exception of the safety hallway lights) went out in the hospital. Let that sink in....moments before my newborn is getting a circumcision, the lights in the hospital went out...all the lights. No, they did not flicker and turn back on...they were off. The doctor then enters the room, cool as a cucumber and humored that we were just sitting there in the dark and just as calmly stated that he did not need lights and the man was not kidding.
We were in the room while they give the babe sugar water to calm them down and a little bit of anesthetic on the area and then we were out of the room.
He told us he would return our newly circumcised son to us in the waiting room in five minutes and boy was he not kidding. FIVE MINUTES!! That is all it took! Check-in and saying "Good Morning" took longer. The doctor actually brought Baby D out to us himself (cue intro to Lion King music) which I thought was really nice as we had thought they would either call us back or have one of the nurses bring him to us.
Although the timeframe can vary (7-10 days is what we were told), it took about five days for the ring to come off. We made sure to put a lot of bacitracin on the site as well as the diaper to ensure as much comfort as possible. Changing a soiled diaper did prove challenging as you are trying to clean thoroughly, but not wanting to create any discomfort by touching the ring and this process no matter how careful, made for quite a fussy babe. All in all he sprung back to his normal only mildly fussy self once the ring fell off. I can tell you that you want to wait until the ring COMPLETELY falls off. Although this may seem like common knowledge, as the ring loosens, it will look like the ring is off, but in may still be attached to the skin. It is important to refrain from touching or messing with it in anyway, it will end up just falling off and being loose in the diaper. Even after the ring falls off the area can still be healing, so I suggest continuing to apply the bacitracin to avoid any type of infection.
The pamphlet they provided had all the information we needed, which kept me off of the Google as I couldn't imagine what my search engine would look like after this. If I wasn't on the radar already, I sure as heck would have been during this.
Even though everything fell into place, I still suggest that if your baby is in the NICU or having any sort of prolonged (longer than 5 days) stay in the hospital and you know you are looking to have your baby circumcised, I suggest that you not only converse closely with the nurses and doctors but reach out to your pediatrician as well to assure that the timeline meets up. Also, you want to make sure that there is no confusion over who is doing what and which doctor (pediatrician, urologist, nephrologist) has the overall say regarding when the circumcision can and will be performed. It seemed like every doctor involved felt it was the other doctor who had the overall say regarding when it could be done. I am not sure what the outcome would have been if we missed the window or had any delay, especially since Hurricane Dorian was right around the corner.
Luckily, he is not traumatized as the Hubs feared and his smiles are developing full on.
