Chapter 9: Week Nine

Sunday  4/29/12

Today: Isaac is eight weeks old.
In One Day: Isaac reaches 31 weeks gestational age.
In Four Days:  Isaac will be halfway between his birth date and his due date.
In Five Days:  Isaac will officially be 2 months old.
In Six Days:  Aaron and I will be doing the walk for March of Dimes (  http://www.marchforbabies.org/s_team_page.asp?SeId=1870820&si  )

Isaac has a week ahead of milestones, growth, eating, sleeping, and hopefully some cuddling with Mommy and Daddy once his oxygen is regulated again.  For now, we'll let him focus on getting rest.  Tomorrow, well, we'll figure it out tomorrow.

Monday-Wednesday

We're making progress on our fundraising for the March of Dimes walk this Saturday.  A couple of Aaron's coworkers have signed up to walk with us and some friends from Melbourne are driving up as well.  The March of Dimes helps to fund the NICU where Isaac is being cared for, and helps in research and medical treatment for preemies throughout the country, so we're glad to take part in giving back.  We're looking forward to meeting other parents and hearing the success stories of their teeny tiny preemies.

Our Teeny Tiny Preemie

On Tuesday, Isaac officially weighed in at 2 lb, 14 oz, doubling his birth weight!  His nurse made him a special sign to commemorate his achivement.  We're so proud of our big boy.

(photo coming soon)

Thursday

As of today, Isaac is officially halfway between his birthday and his due date.  In theory, this means that he is halfway through his stay in the NICU.  However, his lungs have a long way to go, and his progress in weaning off the ventilator is slow this time around, so it's still anyone's guess as to how long he will actually need to stay in the hospital.  We're hoping though that this is the beginning of the countdown for him to come home.

Isaac is getting bigger, but isn't quite big enough to retain his own body heat.  Once he reaches 1500 grams, they'll be able to remove the lid off of his incubator and he'll be allowed to wear preemie clothes.  However, he was given a micropreemie shirt that he will soon be too big for, so today, we were able to put it on long enough to take pictures.  We haven't been able to hold him since he was put back on the ventilator, so he seemed to like the interaction, and was a good sport for photos.

Friday

Isaac is officially 2 months old and weighs a full three pounds!  He is now considered preemie size, from his previous micropreemie title.  Look at how big he is!

On a wary note, he hasn't quite been acting like himself today.  His tummy seems a bit firmer than it should be and slightly bloated, and he has been easily agitated and swinging on his oxygen saturation.  His nurses are hoping that he is merely having an off day, but to be safe, they requested the doctor to examine him and ran some blood work and cultures.  Since the cultures will take 1-3 days for full results, the doctor decided to start him on antibiotics as a precaution.  If the cultures are negative after three days, the medication will be discontinued, but it's much better to err on the side of caution when they're so young, rather than wait for positive results and risk them becoming septic.  Meanwhile, Isaac's only job is to rest, and hopefully tomorrow he'll be feeling better.


Saturday

Once again, we are extremely thankful for Isaac's primary nurses to notice the changes in his behavior, even before monitors picked up on anything.  The first culture results and lung x-rays are in and it looks like Isaac has pneumonia.  Thankfully, he has been on antibiotics since yesterday, so we're hoping it will start the healing process before he has a chance of getting worse.  He has been exhausting himself trying to breath against the flow of the ventilator, so they gave him a mild sedative to help him sleep, allowing the machine to do the breathing for him so his lungs and body can rest and heal.  He was a sleepy boy when we visited today, but very peaceful, not like the agitated state we had seen him in when he was sick before.  His body is tired, but it's stronger than it was even a couple of weeks ago, and he is still able to continue receiving milk, rather than IV fluids like with the GI infection, which is also beneficial in the healing process.  He is one tough little cookie, and we're praying for a good restful night of sleep and healing.