Sunday, July 31, 2011

Week Four

This Friday Lillian turned four weeks old.[1] She's made more progress:
  • She's up to 5 pounds, 12 ounces [2]
  • She's moved up to nursing three times a day instead of two
Unfortunately this has tired her out and so at this point she doesn't wake up for two of her three feedings each day. But we're hopeful that she'll get back up to speed quickly.

WARNING: If you are bothered by pictures of infants in intensive care, you probably shouldn't read on.

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Week Three

This Friday Lillian turned three weeks old.[1] She's made more progress, but we've passed most of the milestones already, so there's not as much to report this time around (that's a good thing):
  • She's been improving in how much milk she can get out of breastfeeding
  • She's gained a pound over her birth weight
However she's still been experiencing a lot of acid reflux. The Prevacid is supposed to help with that, but it's still a problem. It often interferes with her feeding. Sometimes she'll spit up and start to choke. Once that happens she's no longer interested in feeding. Other times she'll hold her breath to prevent the spitup from getting into her lungs and then she'll desat.[2] So now when she's breastfeeding we blow oxygen into her face to lessen the effects of her holding her breath.

WARNING: If you are bothered by pictures of infants in intensive care, you probably shouldn't read on.

Monday, July 18, 2011

Week Two

This Friday Lillian turned two weeks old.[1] She's made even more progress:
  • They've taken her off caffeine [2]
  • They've taken her off the oxygen cannula
  • They've taken her off TPN [3] and removed that IV
  • They've taken her off lipids and removed that IV
  • They've removed her PICC line
  • They've stopped giving her probiotics [4]
  • She's able to suck on a normal-sized pacifier
  • She started non-nutritive breastfeeding
  • She started nutritive breastfeeding
  • She's back up to (and past) her birth weight
  • She's lost her umbilical cord [5]
However, they had to start her on some medication for acid reflux (Prevacid) because she experiences frequent emeses ("spit-ups"). This could be due simply to being born premature (her stomach isn't completely mature), to the caffeine she was on, or to genetics (her Daddy was a spitty baby). They've also started adding calories to her feedings, so that may or may not be exacerbating the problem.

WARNING: If you are bothered by pictures of infants in intensive care or descriptions of changing diapers, you probably shouldn't read on.

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Week One

This Friday Lillian turned one week old.[1] She's made some good progress over that time:
  • They've taken her off sodium bicarbonate [2]
  • They've taken her off antibiotics (ampicillin and gentamicin)
  • She no longer needs a bilirubin light [3]
  • She will suck on a pacifier specially designed for preterm infants
  • They've removed several of her IVs
That last one is only a nominal improvement. The veins in her hands collapsed so they had to remove those IVs. But she still needed the nutrition and medications she was getting through the IVs, so they inserted a PICC line, which is larger than an IV and goes almost all the way to her heart.[4] They also had to start her on an oxygen cannula [5] because she was wearing herself out trying to breath on her own. Nonetheless, she made enough improvement that they moved her out of the 'Emergency' section of the NICU and into what they call the 'Grower and Feeder' section of the NICU.[6]

WARNING: If you are bothered by pictures of infants in intensive care or male chest hair, you probably shouldn't read on.

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Unexpected Delivery

On Wednesday we had a little surprise: Leann's water broke. We weren't expecting anything like this to happen for another two months, so we rushed her to the hospital.[1] The doctors quickly gave her antibiotics (to prevent a bacterial infection of the remaining amniotic fluid), corticosteroids (to help the baby's lungs start producing pulmonary surfactant [2]), and a tocolytic (to suppress the contractions). They also administered low doses of painkillers to help Leann deal with the pain. Despite all this the contractions slowly increased in intensity and frequency. After 40 hours of labor the nurse checked and determined that Leann was dilated to a 9.5. Leann immediately asked for her epidural. Our baby girl was delivered at 1:53 am on July 1st (8 weeks early). At the time of birth she was 17 inches long and weighed 4 pounds, 1 ounce.

WARNING: If you are bothered by descriptions of surgeries or pictures of infants in intensive care, you probably shouldn't read on.