March 21, 2010

It was a quiet weekend for Avery on this first weekend of Spring.

She has made some great progress since my last blog post. She was taken off the ventilator last weekend and placed on CPAP. She did not like the CPAP! She kept trying to rip it off her face and was very fussy with it. I can't say I blame her. It doesn't look so comfortable (as you can see in the video of her from last weekend), but I know she needs it. When I visited her on Monday she was still on the CPAP and doing well, but when I walked in the NICU on Tuesday morning I almost fell over...firstly, she was wearing clothes and secondly, she was no longer on the CPAP, but just a nasal cannula. For those of you who don't know (why would you?) - the CPAP provides pressurized oxygen to her lungs and the nasal cannula is simply oxygen with very little pressure. I had never seen her dressed or had such a wonderful view of her sweet little face. The doctors informed me that she had been doing so well on the CPAP that they decided to try her on just the nasal cannula and she was doing wonderfully. As for the clothes, now that she is extubated and not on the CPAP we don't really do the kangaroo care, so she doesn't have to be naked on my chest. Now I can just cradle her in my arms and we can get a good look at eachother : ) It is so great to get to really snuggle with her and enjoy that time together. You know that the next day I brought in a giant bin of preemie clothes for her! All the cute little outfits that Brielle used to wear (good thing I saved them, huh?).

She did great with the nasal cannula all week long and they also changed they way she is being fed. Now she is being fed every 3 hours! This is to get her ready for bottle feeding, which is supposed to happen later this week (you have no idea how excited I am to give my little girl a ba-ba). So far she has tolerated the every 3 hour feeding extremely well. In fact, she was weighed today (just for fun because "official" weigh ins are on Monday and Thursday) and she weighed 2 pounds 15.3 ounces. You can't get much closer to 3 pounds can you? We're hoping that tomorrow or Tuesday is the "official" 3 pound day - keep your fingers crossed. And another good sign is that she is going crazy for her pacifier. She loves that thing which is great because it shows that she should do well with a bottle. We'll see....

Attached is a photo of me smooching Avery. I love to kiss her sweet little cheeks. And I think she likes it too : ) I have faith that she knows that her mommy is there every single day for her and that I would move mountains for her (and her big sister) if I had to. I don't need justification from my girls or from outside sources to know this is true. There is nothing more important to me in this world right now than my girls and everyone who knows me (and even some who don't) know this. My mom always tells me "the cream rises to the top" and my girls and I are very "creamy" right now! LOL! Thanks for everyone's support and don't forget to keep those prayers for Avery coming. She still has a lot of growing to do...