Birth

After the week of "rest," we had to return to the doctor on Friday afternoon for a check up. P stayed home from school that day to catch up on school paperwork and to spend the entire day relegated to the couch. We headed out to the doctor for our 3:00 appointment to find a very busy office. It was nearly 4:30 before we saw the doctor at which point he sent us straight over to the hospital for more checks and a likely delivery. He said it was very likely we would have these babies before the end of the weekend--and then escorted us over to a room. Once at the hospital, he verified that protein levels and blood pressure were way too high so we were admitted to the hospital only to have the babies in less than an hour. Needless to say we were shocked. We entered the OR at 6:00, got a spinal and an epidural, and at 6:28 Zadie came out screaming only to be followed by her sister, Lia, at 6:30-- not wanting to come out and "jack-knifed" inside.

Zadie was 5 lbs 11 oz and Lia was 5 lbs 6 oz--both had good, strong cries, but Lia was not quite as pink as they would have liked. P got to hold them both briefly as the doctor closed her up. They then took the girls to the NICU and K followed shortly to get to know his girls.

After delivery, P had to be put on magnesium in order to relax muscles to avoid seizures or other scary things associated with high blood pressure. She was concerned about this when all the nurses and doctors groaned about "mag" being such "wicked stuff" with nasty side effects. P was already feeling a bit out of sorts and shaking quite a bit from the changes in blood pressure and the adrenaline, but braced herself for more. As it turns out the mag was wicked, but the worst part of this was that she could not leave her bed or eat solids for almost 24 hours which delayed recovery and delayed seeing the girls.

Both girls were placed on CPAP machines to help regulate breathing. Neither needed extra oxygen, but they just needed the puffs of air to make sure they didn't breathe too fast. They do NOT like these machines one little bit and tend to fight to get the nose plugs out of their nostrils. The nurses also started an IV on Lia to help supplement her feeding tube as they want all her energy to go into learning to breathe. Lia seemed to have a different plan as much of her energy went into removing the IV, screaming, and grabbing things--she likes K's hand. Zadie was able to get off her CPAP within the first 24 hours and held in strong, though her breathing was still a bit fast. Lia graduated from her CPAP about 12 hours later.

After both proved to have mastered breathing (within another 8 hours or so), we moved onto eating and regulating temperatures. Their feeding tubes were switched to their noses and they got to switch to regular old baby beds with no extra bells and whistles by day 3. They were able to be in a space right next to each other so we kind of had our own semi-private room. Temperatures were no problem--just monitored carefully. So it was just feeding that we needed to figure out--8 feeds per day by nipple along with weight gain is the goal. Zadie has been highly motivated to eat, but Lia is much less so because she is more of the typical preemie who lacks the coordination to suck, swallow, then breathe. The nurses have been training her to do this and she is now taking close to three entire feedings by bottle each day Zadie is taking all 8 and will likely be released to go home today or tomorrow. It is amazing to see their progress each day as we see lots of developmental changes and more awake time each day.