Birthday Ticker

Lilypie - Personal pictureLilypie First Birthday tickers

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Good Bye NICU, Welcome home!

Ok, so I have not updated this in a really long time...soooo much has happened! First, I'll start with the last few days in the NICU: We celebrated the girls 1 month birthday and they wore new outfits (that I had to iron...really?) Memorial day weekend, Nick's Aunt had come to visit and while his mom and she were visiting the girls, they both took whole bottles. Overnight, they both took most of their bottles and were nursing VERY well...on Monday, I asked a nurse when would we stop giving them 1/2 of their feed (after they nursed well, they would drop 1/2 of the full amount of the feed down their tube). The answer I got was confusing- when they start doing better with the bottle...hummm. I didn't really say anything then, but it didn't really make sense to me. The girls never really showed any signs of being hungry, and I wondered if we keep them full, when will this ever happen?!?! Later that day, another nurse hinted that maybe we should not give them the rest of the feed if they nursed well the next time, and I was all for that! (she wasn't our primary nurse, but talked to our nurse and said she would be the one responsible) So we didn't give them more, they slept for about 3 hours and woke up hungry! Imagine that! After this, as they said would happen, the light just went on. We were told the course of action for discharge after this point is that they will set a minimum mL that they have to take w/o dropping the extra milk down their tubes (i.e. they have to take 36mL out of a 50mL feed), after a few days of that (when they don't need to put any milk down the tubes), they will pull the tubes completely and do feeding on demand and look to see consistent weight gain over another few days. Also, because they were doing better nursing than bottle feeding, they talked about to having us stay in a suite with the girls for 24 hrs to see if they would gain weight- they hinted that they might have us do this by the end of the week (WOW). We were told to watch some videos and bring in the car seat for the car seat challenge- getting ready for discharge!! About midweek, Lailey pulled out her tube, and the nurse didn't put it back in...not "until we need it" wink wink. A little later, Kennedy did the same thing (oops, says the nurse)- the tubes NEVER went back in, they took all of their feeds consistently w/o needing any minimum to be set- we owe it all to our nurse that was willing to give them a little push!! After 2 days of weight gain, there was talk of going home "not before friday, but maybe sat, sun or mon". Thrilling!! Thursday night, a nurse called the dr and discussed us going home fri (June 4th), since the girls were doing so well...dr agreed and discharge was slated for the next day! There was a catch though, they needed to show a weight gain overnight, but they had steadily gained weight all week, so we weren't worried. So we excitedly went out for our "last" dinner, did some baby shopping and cleaned the important parts of the house. On our way home, we called the NICU to check in and got depressing news- Kennedy lost weight. I was devastated and angry. Angry because the NICU had been having trouble with their AC and it was FREEZING in there all day. For fear that they would lose weight, I kept putting an additional blanket on them during the day while I was there, but came back to find the blankets removed each time...So I spent the evening busy, but fearful about the news we would receive the next day. We called in the morning, and got the same news, with the addition that Lailey hadn't made a notable gain either. UGH! Now we may not bring EITHER home...I wanted to scream and cry and stomp my feet, because I KNEW it was from the temperature in there (maybe not, but I had to blame something). Nick had taken off and we went to the NICU to feed the girls and we had a "swaddle bath" lesson from the OT scheduled for 10am (which I HIGHLY recommend if you have a newborn- it is WONDERFUL). We waited throughout the morning to talk to the Nurse practitioner or doctor, who typically do rounds mid-morning to see what the verdict was- we hadn't gotten a definite no, but a yes seemed unlikely, given the circumstances. After waiting all morning, the NP passed through, however we missed her- our nurse went and talked to her and thanks again to nursing advocates, we got the thumbs up to bring BOTH of them home! BOTH! I wanted to do a dance, as I thought for sure that only Lailey would be coming home that afternoon, if either of them. The NP was called to a delivery, so we had to wait, but we didn't even care...we went to lunch, packed up their stuff and loaded the car...this seemed surreal! We got to share the good news with our 2-south nurse friends and were able to get a pic together on the way out. What a bittersweet moment! I had been at that hospital everyday for almost 3 months! We owe sooo much to everyone there and it was sad to say goodbye...I still feel a little sad when I think of all of the wonderful people there. How can you ever express your gratitude for what they did for us?

So now we are home! I felt like we were going to get in 8 car accidents on the way home, but we made it! Nick was able to take the week off, so we could get adjust to life at home...it was weird not to have to go anywhere and to all be home at the same time!! All the days seem to run together now...feeding, sleeping, baby laundry, dishes (for bottle washing mostly) then its time to feed them again! We went to our first dr's appt and they are both gaining weight at a good pace. I can't complain about their sleeping schedule- 3 to 4 hours at a time. Dr says we still have to wake them up to eat in the middle of the night for a little while longer. Some nights I think they would actually sleep the whole night...we accidently slept through our alarm one night and I woke up about 5 1/2 hours later (oops!). The nursery is coming together and the baby stuff is slowly making its way out of the dining room (finally!). Nick went back to work this week- he was very sad, but only has two more weeks and then is off for the summer! My actual due date is this Tues (June 22) so the girls will finally be a corrected age, rather than a gestational week, or a negative number ;). Ok, gotta go make bottles!! Here's some pics:

1 month birthday outfits:



First family picture!

"Formal" Picture day- Last day

Photographer @ NICU:

Swaddle bath lesson:

Going home! June 4, 2010

Nurses from 2-south...We will miss you!

GOING HOME!!
First night @ home

First bath @ home
Cuddles!