To get out of here Taylor needs to do 2 things. The first is that she needs to take all of her feedings by breast or bottle, and the second is that she needs to have 5-8 days w/out any major apnea spells.
Taylor has not yet taken to the breast as well as we had hoped. She has had 3 feedings so far from the breast that have been more than 1/2 of her feeding. For the most part she takes a little and then proceeds to fall asleep. We started trying the bottle last week. It has had mixed results as well although she has taken 2 full feedings now by the bottle. Everything else she has still been getting from the feeding tube. We hope that this trend changes soon.
As far as apnea spells go, Taylor has continued to have recorded ones (even today), although the last major one (at least according to us) came Friday. Taylor had her second bath, and then followed it by drinking her first full bottle. She went to sleep with a full belly, and worn out by her bath. She proceeded to fall in to a deep sleep and oops forgot that breathing thing. This is not unusual. Most preemies begin to outgrow these around 35-36 weeks, which is what Taylor is. She'll be 36 on Wed. Hopefully she won't have any more. Otherwise, we'll be here longer.
Michelle asked the doctor on Friday how long. He said a week to a week and a half. This gels with the 37 weeks he told me once. I was really hoping to be home before Thanksgiving and for us to have a big Thanksgiving dinner at our home, but I'm starting to think its not going to happen (or maybe we'll be home by Thanksgiving but not early enough to have the house ready). It would be nice, but I'll be happy just to have her home soon.
Michelle has been at the hospital all week. Tristan and Haylee both got sick during the week and we weren't able to come up until Friday night. It was hard not seeing Taylor or Michelle for the whole week. Taylor has changed so much. Her cheeks are so chubby. And her hands are so big now. We stayed in the family room Friday night and then Michelle came home with us during the day yesterday. Shanon took the kids last night and Michelle and myself came back for the night.
It seems Taylor is developing a sense of humor, or I'm just unlucky. Last night I was holding her after Michelle fed her and I made the comment to Taylor and Michelle how nice it was to be holding and not having alarms going off anymore and how weird it was. 3 minutes later, she bradied. Argh! I was so close to having my first alarm-free holding with her. Anyway, she then pooped. We put her back up soon later and Michelle hinted strongly that it was my diaper to change. I joked back saying that I would call the nurse (there are some benefits to being in the NICU) but then went ahead and changed it. I was wiping her butt (stimulating her sometimes causes more pooping) and joked with her "just don't spray it all over me" and looked at Michelle and smiled. Just then there was gargantuan explosion and my poor innocent hand was dripping in poop. I seemed to have uncorked something. It kept coming and coming and coming. It was like one of those snakes on the 4th of July that you light a match too... I think Michelle almost had a bradie herself, she was laughing so hard she couldn't breathe. Ha ha, really funny... But hey she pooped A LOT and that was a good thing. Even I could smell it though (and I can't smell worth a dang).
Anyway, that's about it for now. Hopefully she gets going on this feeding better soon and stops having any apnea. Then we can go home.
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