From April 28th...
We left the hospital this afternoon around 4:30 PM (going back later tonight). They were moving Emily from the NICU to the PCN (Progressive Care Nursery). She finished her antibiotics today so they finally removed that big, obnoxious IV block and saline lock from her poor little elbow. She screamed like they were killing her... but not so much from removing the actual needle. More when they pulled the tape off. She did not like that a bit!
The MRI was perfect and the EEG was perfect. Still no abnormalities that they can find. I also learned yesterday that they did an echocardiogram (also known as a cardiac echo). Basically it's an ultrasound of the heart and they said her heart looks perfect. They did an EKG (which was also perfect) and X-rays on her Sunday (also perfect).
They are still saying she has to make it for 5 consecutive days without an "episode" before they will release her. At 6:00 PM tonight she will have gone 48 hours without any breathing "episodes". They want us to take an infant CPR class before she is discharged (which is a good idea anyway, even if she wasn't having these problems). We have both been CPR certified for infants before but it's been a few years (4 years since my last certification, not sure about Gair). They may also send us home with a monitor that would sound alarms should her breathing slow down too much.
Overall she seems to be pretty content and happy. She is breastfeeding better and has gained some weight. We won't be able to use any of the newborn diapers we have for her when we get her home! Oh well... we just want to get her home!
From April 30th...
Not much to report today. We haven't seen a doctor in 2 days. There is always one present in the NICU, but they come and go in the PCN. She gets examined by a Neonatologist everyday in the morning. Since she had the two apneic episodes yesterday (apnea is any form of stopped breathing, regardless of the cause... it can even be on purpose if you hold your breath), it appears that the countdown timer reset and she will be held for 5-7 days for observation starting from yesterday.
Overall she seems to be doing fine. I think the hardest thing is that we can't bring her home. I commented to Gair today that Emily is a week old and has never been outside. It's very frustrating. It feels like we're going to visit someone in jail (because she can't leave). I admitted to Gair today that I feel love for Emily and I feel very close to her, but she doesn't feel like my daughter. It feels like she belongs to someone else... like I'm her uncle or something. To me, that is the hardest part. I think it's probably harder on Gair since she carried her for 9+ months. It's so anti-climatic. We had this wonderful birth experience a week ago, and since Sunday it hasn't been all that great.
Since she's most likely coming home on a monitor, we're going to have be extra picky about who is responsible for her during the day when we're both at work. We're also going to require that anyone who is going to babysit her be Infant CPR certified. We took our Infant CPR refresher course last night. Both Gair and I have had CPR (Infant and Adult) certifications in the past. I know I've been certified and re-certified 5 or 6 times. The class we took last night did not give us certification, but we will look to expand upon the refresher course we had last night soon.
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