Katrina Storie Part 1
As you may know my family and I are saviors of Hurricane Katrina. I want you to know the truth and our experiences we face before during and after Katrina hit land. I know this will take an lot of blogs passage to tell our store. That okay it's important to me that you know our experience as it is for me to share it with you.
To give you a brief background info about us. My wife and I got married on Dec. 26, 2004. A few weeks after we got married we found out that were having a baby. The doctors told us that our child would be born around Oct. 2, 2005. Like most new parents to be we started preparing for the baby to come in this world. Nothing repaired us how early she would come into this world. On Aug. 14, 2005 my wife had to have an emergency C-section that my wife and daughter life was on the line. My wife made it okay but just in a lot of pain. Our little daughter was 7 weeks early and now rush to the NICU. My wife and I never felt so helpless and scared for our daughter. Seeing her with wire and tubs come from her we pray that she will be okay. Of course we would never image how much more we would have to experience with in 2 week before Katrina hit our life.
The night before (Saturday Aug 28th) we visited our daughter in the NICU and found out that we couldn't stay with her if the hurricane came our way, so we left there got gas and went home to have a late dinner watch the news and decided not to pack or make any decisions until the next morning to see if Katrina turned.
Sunday morning, about 9 am I heard a lot of commotion outside. I went to check it out and seen our neighbors running around like chickens with their heads coming off. They told my that Hurricane Katrina is at Cat 5 and heading for us. I went back to bed and told me wife what going on. I told her not to worry and I will start packing and for her to get some more sleep. (She was 2 weeks out from having that c-section and still in a ton of pain). Her reaction is to turn the news on and try to call her parents in NH. but no answer. She left about lots of message and then got on the computer and emailed everyone saying that we were going to see our daughter and then make a decision what we were going to do.
Since the hurricane hit between two pay periods and we had already paid our bills for the month and were very low on funds and just filled our gas tank. Most of all we knew that we weren't going to go far because we couldn't leave our little girl. My wife and I talked about going to the Superdome but decided no. If there any flooding we wouldn't be able to get to the hospital. If the power went out there would be no electricity and it would get really hot in there. Then we thought about staying in the car at the hospital parking lot where our daughter was at or staying at the hospital waiting room. But our last resort going to a shelter in Slidell or Pearl River.
I packed all the stuff that we had bought for our daughter, our clothes, some non perishable food, all our blankets and pillows and the big preggo pillow for my wife since getting comfy was still so hard for her, and some stuff to entertain us in the shelter or where ever we'd end up. My wife packed a box with things that she didn't want to loose like our wedding pictures, her high school diploma, pictures from when we met, the build a bears that we got each other, our marriage licence, our SS card and Birth Certificate, and the recipes that were her grandma.
By the time we left for the hospital the traffic was so back up it took us 2 hour to get there. I would have been longer if my wife didn't took a few back road short cuts. It normally take us about 40 minutes to get there but not today. When we finally got to the hospital and into the NICU they were in the process of moving the babies to the second floor ICU in the middle of the building.
We were the only parents there. All the other parents evacuated. My wife got to hold our little girl for as long as she wanted that day. Then it was time for them to move her, she was the last one, we got to go with her and see where they were going to putting her and see that they had set up a make shift NICU, (definitely with out all the standards they had down stairs but it was safe), in the middle of the building and high enough that if it flooded they'd be okay. We were told that the babies would get power from the generators first before anyone else. We were giving bracelets so that we could get back in and had to give next of kin information before we left.
We went down stairs to the waiting room, and talked about staying in the parking lot. At this point it was raining and the wind was picking up. We went to the cafe and got some dinner and then left for the shelter that was not far from the hospital. There was no traffic it was raining on and off. We went to the first shelter and we were not comfortable with it. There were too many people, too many cars so we left and went to another one.
We were the last two let in at the last shelter before the storm begin. We found a spot on the floor and set up camp. We were right by the Red Cross desk and not to close to any windows. So we got as comfortable as we could. Filled both our Britta pitchers, all the cups, and bottles that we had with water. We didn't know how long the water fountain would work. The power in the shelter went out around 5:30 am. We started to listen to the radio, only got one station. There was only one that was broadcasting and they didn't have a ton of information. But what we have heard wasn't good. The weirdest thing that I do remember is the smokers going outside under the awning to smoke at same point they moved everyone from the gym to the cafe because part of the roof riped off and it was leaking. By 4 or 5 pm the winds died down and the rain have stopped. We made it through the the storm. The Red Cross gave us little food thy had and would later break into the school kitchen and the freezer for more food.
It wasn't until Wednesday that we were able to get to our daughter. (This is getting long so i am skipping a lot of the details) It had flooded and the parking lot got 8 feet of water at the hospital, they had no power, and no water. When we finally got to her she and all the other babies were just in their diapers. It was so hot that even the ones in open bassinets were just hanging out being naked. We'd later learn that this was the only hospital that stayed open for a 250 radius. The parish hospital down the street wouldn't share their formula or diapers for the babies at this hospital even though they were closed, damaged, and not accepting patients.
FEMA have arrived that day with food, water, and ice when we were at the hospital checking on our daughter. Our "neighbors" in the shelter got us some water and food since we weren't able to get over there. The next day; since the hospital didn't have any ice, we went and got them about 24 bags of ice. We will never forget the looks on their faces when we showed up with that ice. They were so happy as we were that night when we first got some ice. We couldn't get enough of it it was so cold and it was so good.
A week after Katrina destroyed good part of southern Louisiana the NICU doctor told us that they got some good news. They told us if they could get an portable heart and resporty monitor we would be able to leave with our daughter. If only we promise to leave Louisiana and keep her far away from this mess as possible and don' t bring her to a shelter. (They telling us all this if we don't it may kill her with all the germs and vires out there.) I told them we would go to NH since that where my In-Laws are. FEMA brought us the monitor and the next day we left to NH.
I know there a lot of holes in this blogs and I promise I'll fill in the the other detail. In just I wanted you know our side of Katrina tale.. I do want to let you know we all doing good. My daughter is healthy and about 2 years old now.
I am open to any commets or queastions you may have.
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