Patrick is pretty amazing. They took him off the CPAP this morning and he's been on just the cannula all day at room air. He's kind of funny... when they give him a pacifier, sometimes he gets so into it that he forgets to breathe! There were a couple times today where he just wasn't taking deep enough breaths and the alarm went off because his oxygen was too low, but he was always able to get back to the 90% range on his own!
The doctor decided that they would try feeding him today, so starting at noon he got 3ccs of milk. They will give him 3ccs every 3 hours and see how he tolerates it. They had to put a feeding tube down his mouth to his stomach and they let gravity pull the milk down. It takes just a minute or so to get it all in! With babies this small, they want to go slow to check for any bowel obstructions, perferations or abdominal hardness. Again, he was doing everything well. Hopefully he'll poop in the next couple days!
They started phototherapy for jaundice today, so Patrick is hanging out in his tanning bed with the mask covering his eyes like Will did. His color is so much more normal tonight. It's easier to take pictures of him when he's wearing the mask because we're not worrying about the flash bothering him.
Right now he has some lines in through his belly button measuring his blood pressure and other things, but the blood gasses they've tested have all come back good, so those lines could come out in a few days. When the lines are out, that means we might be able to start holding him! He would just have the nose tube and some sensors on him, so it would be really easy to get him out of the incubator. We're really excited for the first time we get to hold him, but we don't want to make him do anything he isn't ready for.
Sometime I'll have to get a video of him crying. I think the nurse described it best when she said he sounded like a kitten. Most of the time he's just relaxing in his little nest, but sometimes he just gets mad! Tonight he did really well when I took his temp, and he only got upset when the nurse picked him up to get his weight. Tonight he was down to 2 lbs 11 oz, but they're not worried about it because he's been peeing like crazy. Hopefully with the feeds he'll start gaining weight.
I still can't find the right cord to get pictures from our camera on here, but my mom (Hi Grandmalissa!) emailed me some from yesterday, so here they are!
We have pictures of him just a few hours old on Grandma Vickie's camera, as soon as I get those they'll be up here too.It's nice to have good news to share!
5 comments:
What a great looking kiddo! Can't wait until we can hold him when we visit!
Rock on!
Ben and Shari
with the "sunglasses" on, and his hands in a sort of gang sign shape, he kinda looks like a wannabe gangsta in that last picture.
he's like "what? what? all the ladies want in on this action"
and the weird thing is WE DO! BAAAAABY!
Yayness all around! I'm so happy for you Jen!
Great pictures! I love good news!
Congratulations! Brooke just sent me the link to your blog and I got on right away. Reading your posts brings back so many memories of our time in the NICU. Patrick is a little miracle and doing so well! He is pretty much the exact same size as Kayley when she was born, but he is doing so much better with the breathing than she did at first. That just shows how important each extra day in the womb is. I will continue to read your updates and we wish you the best and hopefully a short stay in the NICU!
Megan Thiel
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