Vampire Guilt

Yes, we "vampires" can feel remorse.

I was reminded of this over the weekend.

We had 28 week twin boys born at the hospital on Saturday.

When Labor and Delivery notifies NICU of an upcoming birth, the entire floor goes on alert. In fact, those of us scheduled in the nursery lab also notify our colleagues in Critical Care to be on alert in case they have to come up and help for a bit.

We might get called into Labor and Delivery prior to birth to take blood from the laboring mother. Many times we are in the room shortly after the birth (and sometimes waiting in the room, although this is very rare).

Generally, though, we know the delivery has occurred when the umbilical cord blood is brought to the lab. While that's being tested, we try to get everything else out of the way that we can in case we're called.

Saturday I was working with Dean, who many of you have heard me talk about as the other trainer who works with me on adult phlebotomy.

The cord blood had barely arrived when Dean took the call for me to head to Twin A's room.

He was still being checked over, poked, prodded, and suffering the indignities that most every newborn goes through.

But, this little guy, only 3/4 baked in his mother's 'oven' was in trouble. When they saw me at the door, I was hurried to the bedside.

The staff was catering to what I needed for that brief moment in time. I did the stick, and the attending nurse watched my rhythm and matched hers to coordinate with what we both needed to do. She was even able to instruct a student nurse to start an IV while I was drawing the child. There was a part of me that was proud because they were able to work with me instead of waiting for me to be finished. Time is so critical during those first minutes.

I, in turn, kept an eye on the student nurse and as I was finished drawing the blood gas, was able to tailor my work to coincide with her IV stick.

Both of our tasks completed, I headed back to the lab, and they continued to stablilze the little boy.

An hour later, I had to draw some more labs on Twin A. They'd put another IV in his foot, so I had to look once again at the foot I'd previously stuck, moments after his birth.

The guilt hit quickly. Half his foot was black.

I prayed that it was ink from his footprint.

But, it didn't wipe off.

The necessity of drawing three separate tubes an hour before on a baby whose circulatory system had only barely began to work alone had taken its toll. I'd bruised that poor little heel with my orders to take blood.

It's just plain miserable to know that not only were you the first person who created his first experience with pain from an unknown source had also created one of the first marks on his body.

It just plain sucks to know that when his mother comes to see him for the first time since he was born and carefully checks him over, and counts his fingers and toes for the first time, she's going to see that someone has already "hurt" her son.

No, it can't be helped, and it was necessary to help save his life, but as a mother who's been thrilled at counting all the fingers and toes of her own children, it still creates angst in an emotional place shared, I'm sure, by the common bond of motherhood.

Note: Twin A has done very well and has already been moved from Bay 1 to Bay 2. His brother, Twin B, is still in Bay 1 on a vent and is struggling a bit at this time. He doesn't have to be "stuck" by the vampire team; he is sick enough that arterial lines have been started on him. However, his numbers look good under the circumstances, so we're hopeful that the next few days will bring about some wonderful changes for him.