A Small Scare

Dear Samuel,

Well, you gave us a bit of a scare today......

Every time we have had a bath scheduled, you seem to weasel your way out of it by having a "bad" day (Last time you came back positive for your infection, another time you had been having a rough day with de-sats). Today you began to have an apnea attack (Meaning you stopped remembering to breath...very similar to sleep apnea) and de-saturate. Enough so, that your nurse said that your color changed and you looked "mottled" (blotchy, spotty). At one point, you had a 3 minute span of time where they had difficulty getting your saturation levels and heart rate back to normal. There was a small chance you would have had to be re-intubated (vent tube) if they were unable to get your levels back but luckily that wasn't the case.

Of course, by the time your Mom and I got there all of your levels were A-Okay for around 2 hours. Sometimes, we think your nurses like to lie to us....When you are having a good day before we get there to visit, you de-sat right when we walk in. If you are having a bad day, we walk in and everything is fine. But really, your nurses are awesome...you just like to do the opposite of what they tell us.

Your doctors and nurses ran a bunch of tests to try to find the cause of this little spell but everything came back negative (Blood tests will be cultured for 5 days again). X-Ray showed NO signs on pneumonia, so that's good.

Some small changes today, in terms of feedings. You were bumped up to 15 ccs of breastmilk every 3 hours being feed over a 2 hour period with an hour between feedings to vent bubbles out of your tummy. They also had to bump up your respiration rate to 30 bpm after you little apnea spell. O2 was back down to 48% when we left for the night.

Your weight is still at 1 pound 11.5 ounces.

So, we are supposed to give you a bath tomorrow. This better not happen again!

Love,
Mom and Dad

Everybody Poops

Dear Samuel,

What a HUGE day you had! From our perspective, two really BIG milestones.

1. BM (Poop for the layperson)
The doctors were beginning to get concerned that you had not a BM yet and upped your suppositories to try and help things along. Well, apparently it worked because your nurse said it was a pretty big one.

2. Weight
At your weigh-in this morning at 2:00 a.m. you were back to your birth weight of 1 pound 6.2 ounces!

I think both of these milestones may have something to do with the fact that you are now receiving 5 ccs (milliliters) of breastmilk every 3 hours (up from 3 ccs).

We did have a Scare today too. This morning as the radiologist was reading your X-ray, they called up to the NICU nurses to alert them that they saw something in your lungs and that it was possible that lung could collapse. As soon as that happened your vitals started to drop. The nurses started suctioning some "gunk" out of your lungs, moved you around to get some further X-rays and started prepping to put in a chest tube. As the new X-rays were being looked at by the radiologist they weren't able to see the gunk in your lungs anymore. As the day wore on the nurses left the equipment for the chest tube in your room to ward off any "evil spirits" and so far it seems to have worked. They also started some Chest PT (essentially a little massager/vibrator) to break up the gunk in your lungs. Ever since that little scare this morning, your vital stats have been great and you have been resting for most of the day.

Here's a picture of when your Mom and I came to visit tonight.

Never thought I would be so happy for someone to poop, but I guess that's what happens when you become a parent. Sam, we are so excited and proud to be your parents and looking forward to the journey ahead. You have defied the odds so far, let's keep it going.

Love,
Mom and Dad