Introducing...
Alvin Hendrich Santos Aguiluz
Alvin was born on
the first day of October 1999, at 2007 hrs. He was delivered by Dr.
Pablito Tancinco in The Good Samaritan Hospital here in Los Angeles.
He weighed 5 pounds and 14.8 ounces, and he was 19 inches long. October
1 - 0830 Hrs October 1 - 0930
Hrs October
1 - 1745 Hrs October
1 - 1900 Hrs October 1 -
1915 Hrs October
1 - 2007 Hrs Bruce and
Millie were outside the delivery room when Lanie was giving birth.
Kuya came in later since he got lost on his way to the hospital. October
1 - 2300 Hrs October 2 Jasmin and her husband
Tony came to visit around 11:00. They were able to see Alvin.
Claudia came around 1:30. She saw Alvin, and then they moved him to
the NICU. Kuya Ronald, Ate Allie, and their kids came in to see the
baby. Kuya later arrived also with Gilbert and his mom. October
3 Kuya
came after attending mass, and then waited until we checked out of the
hospital. Alvin stayed behind. Poor mommy. October
4 October
5
I was doing a callback for a customer who cannot connect to the
internet when he received a page from Lanie. It was 911! I do
not have the cell phone with me! Jerico Z was next to me and he knew
what was happening so he lent me his cell phone and I called Lanie.
Needless to say, I bolted out of there.
After a near collision outside the hospital parking lot, we were able
to secure a parking space in the main structure and was on our way to get
Lanie admitted. I had to stay on the lobby to finalize the
paperwork, and the receptionist just informed me later on that Lanie was
admitted. No false alarm here... Room 859.
Lanie could not stand the pain of the contractions anymore, so she
followed the advise of Rachel, our attending nurse that was so helpful, to
take a pain killer. She gave Lanie 1 ml thru IV, and she felt dreamy
after that. Rachel explained that the drowsiness will let Lanie
relax a bit, thereby making the baby go down faster.
Lanie wanted to push already, but the doctor wasn't there yet.
Another nurse came in and set the table up for the doctor. A new
nurse will take care of us now since Rachel is off the clock by this time,
but was still sweet enough to stay a little longer. Kirsten, the new
nurse, let's just say we wanted another one.
Lanie was given the signal to start pushing. After a while, I could
see the baby's hair. The doctor told the nurse to inform him if the
"head" was already about a half-dollar size.
Alvin was born. It was very overwhelming since I was
shoulder to shoulder with the doctor when he came out. Lanie's
suffering was replaced by surprise because after the doctor pulled the
baby out, he placed him on Lanie's stomach, thereby giving her the best
view when he was sucking out the fluids out of the baby's nose and mouth.
Lanie was heard to utter: "Hi Alvin."
We were moved to Room 770 for the remainder of our stay in the
Hospital. Alvin, however, can't keep a normal temperature. He
was 96 degrees so another nurse, Fran, took him from us and then kept him
for the night.
Alvin was returned early in the morning. His pediatrician, Dr. Lagman,
informed us that Alvin had high white blood cell count, and that he would
be transferred to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. There they can check
whether he has an infection of not.
We visit Alvin in the NICU every chance we get (since Lanie was weak
and needed some rest). Lanie and I also fed him there, and the
nurses were already teaching us the basics for handling a newborn.
I went back to work to finalize my leave of absence. I took two
weeks off. When I got home, Lanie was laying on the floor
agonizing in pain. She was vomiting and she has diarrhea. We
called Dr. Tancinco and he informed us that it must be food poisoning from
the fish that she ate for lunch. We believed him, but when it was
already unbearable, I took Lanie to the ER at Good Sam. The ER
physician was sort of pissed at both Lanie's OB and her primary care physician
since they vehemently ruled out postpartum as the problem, which it
was. We got home around 1:00 in the morning, October 5.
Around 5:00 in the afternoon, Lanie was feeling better and we were on
our way to take Alvin home. 5:30, Alvin was laid down on his crib
for the first time.