Learning to Breathe

Let's start with her stats from yesterday - 2lbs. 14oz. at the start of the day.  We've also discovered they weigh pretty early in the evenings... So as of last night we're up to 2lbs. 15oz.!!  Almost 3lbs!!  We're packing it on now!  Holding steady at 12mls a feeding right now.  We came off the lipids (fats) yesterday!  Only one more IV fluid left to get rid of - which will leave once we get a little higher on our feeding number.  The nurse thinks that will be in 3-4 days.  Still holding at a 1 on our oxygen.  We're hopeful that will come down again today.

Yesterday was alright.  I was overly emotional and moody, but what's new?  On our way up to see Sarah, we hit solid, stopped traffic on the interstate. No way to get off, no way to move.  I was afraid we were going to miss her 2 pm feeding.  Her feeding times are the special times.  That's when they'll open up her isolette and let us really get in there and interact with her.  We're allowed to change her diaper, take her temperature, touch her, talk to her, and most importantly hold her... I was terrified we'd get there and the nurse would have already done most of those tasks and we'd have to wait another 3 hours before we could do them again.

We pulled in the parking lot at 1:55.  What if the nurse went ahead and started a few minutes early??  Jim didn't seem very phased by this "problem" that I had.  Of course we finally got up there, signed in, used the restroom, scrubbed in - JUST in time.  The nurse was just starting to warm up her milk for her feeding.

I was so worked up that we might miss it, that it took almost the entire visit to calm down.  It was my day to hold her, which I was excited about.  Since she's still so small and frail, they only let us hold once a day - so dad and I rotate right now who gets the honor of holding her.  Now that all her jaundice lights are gone we can hold up to an hour a day.  What a special hour it is.  

I chose to wrap her in blankets and hold her like you would a normal baby, instead of the kangaroo care that is really good for her development.  Selfishly I just wanted to be able to look at her.  When you're holding her kangaroo style, she's up on your bare chest just under your chin.  You can't see her face at all. I wanted to talk to her and watch her face.  

I found I didn't have much to say as I was still cooling off from our near miss at doing all those mundane tasks that most mommies and daddies take for granted or often grumble about.  I was just content to look at her.  To look at her features and see what I could see.  I can't figure out who's lips she has yet.  They're just so tiny it's hard to tell.  Her nose is smooshed with the oxygen cannula so there's really no way to tell that either.  Right now, she's just incredibly her own person.  Honestly, I wouldn't want it any other way.