Esther's 1 week old!

And what a week we've had!  She's come so far, but has so far to go yet.  Originally they said she'd be here for about a week, but here we are at one week, and we could very likely be here for another week at least.  This is discouraging, but I'm trying to concentrate on her progress.

I wasn't able to post yesterday as I had a terrible migraine, so I spent all my free time napping and resting trying to get rid of the headache.

Esther had a good day - she's still off biliruben lights, she is also out of the isolette and in a regular (huge) crib now.  She's been holding her own heat pretty well, but we've figured out that like many of her siblings, she doesn't tolerate synthetic fibers - we were given a really cute hate, but it's acrylic and she starts to really heat up, sweat, and even breathe really fast.  So we are going to stick with cotton hats for her!

Now that she's in a regular crib, she gets to wear cloths and we can hold her as much as we want!  Yeah!  She does so much better if she's nearly verticle, so they've got a special thing attached to the crib that wraps around her and holds her in place against the inclined mattress.  She's surrounded by her new stuffed animals and is loving it.



Her new IV ended up having to come out yesteday afternoon, but it was decided to concentrate on getting her feeding going and not use the IV anymore - so far she's doing great!  She was at 35 ccs all day yesterday, and today, we are going to be upping her feeds by 3 ccs every other feed - if this goes well, she'll be at the level she needs to be in order to go home in about 3 days.

She still is getting a tiny bit of Oxygen, but it's really minimal.  We use the feeding tube if she tuckers out before getting her whole meal, or if she's sound asleep at feeding time - this is working really well for her.

So today's prayer needs -

Esther tolerates the increase in feeds, her biliruben continues to decline, and her need for Oxygen continues to decrease.

That my feet stop swelling so bad, my blood pressure responds to the meds, my iron level goes up quickly, that my millk supply increases to meet her needs, and that I can get the sleep and rest I need (I lost the camping room, so I don't have a bed to nap in - I was booted out yesterday evening, so I ended up sleeping at my Aunt Marylin's home - what a blessing to not have to drive all the way home when I'm so tired - 10 minutes instead of 30 is good!).