Esther might go home tomorrow!

She's doing great!  She's off everything, even her IV!  She's on all oral medications right now, and taking a bottle for some of her feedings.  She's about where she was before her troubles that started at the beginning of December, taking around 40 ccs by bottle, and then we give her another 60 ccs through her feeding tube.

The key to her going home is that she needs to be gaining weight, but not retaining fluids (making sure that taking her Lasix orally is working and that she is on the right dosage).  Tomorrow morning's weight will tell all.  This morning compared to yesterday afternoon was good, so that much is good.

We got her bed all set up with her new and old friends watching over her:



Oh and she's got her smile back - she doesn't give out a lot of them, but she;s definitely smiling again.

The only pain reliever she's on is tylenol, and if she didn't ever get hick-ups, she probably wouldn't even need that.

The challenge is picking up and holding her - we can't pick her up using her arm pits - she needs to be scooped up.

They said she could be laid on hertummy against your chest, but that would really depend on her level of comfort, and so far, she doesn't like it at all, so cuddling the way like to cuddle Esther will have to wait a little longer. But, right now I can pick her up and hold her all I want.

Esther even got a bath today! We couldn't let her incision get soaked, so it didn't have as much water as usual, but she definitely got a bath, and man did she ever need it - mostly from adhesives left from surgery.

She looked so cute after her bath:



And last but not least, Happy New Year everyone!