There were a couple of positive developments today with little Ms. Emma. First of all, they increased her milk intake yet again to 27ml every 3 hours. That's good for a total of 7.2 oz every day. So far, so good. She's tolerating it all very well and doing a great job. Second, as you can see in the picture, Emma had her first meal from a bottle today. Of the 27 total milliliters in the feeding at 2pm today with Mommy, Emma took approximately 6ml from the bottle! Brit said that she did very well with this. Feeding a preemie is much different than feeding any full term baby. With a baby that's carried to term, you just tuck them into your elbow and give them a bottle. Apparently with a preemie, you have to lay them down on your leg, on their side and feed them that way. It's a completely different approach. The reasoning behind this is the breathing issue. If the baby has an apnea episode during a feed, if they're laying down in your elbow they'll get the food down into their lungs. But if they're on their side on your leg, then the food will just come out and they won't choke on it. But it's just different, yet another example of the quirkiness of having a preemie. But again, Emma did very, very well with the feed. She's quite a little trooper!Another big development for Emma, as you can also see in the picture, is she's wearing clothes now. They've turned off the heat in her isolette, dressed her in clothes, and she's now regulating her own body temperature. The reason for that is that she gained weight again last night. She's now just shy of 3 pounds, less than an ounce away. That's as of 11pm last night, so maybe by the time they weigh her tonight she'll have crossed that next threshold.
So other than the breathing issue, which is still not resolved but not worsening, she's doing well. She is still on a little more oxygen than she has been before, but it's not getting worse at this point. She's held steady the last couple of days so we're at least encouraged by that. But you may remember a couple weeks ago that there were three criteria for her being able to come home. First, the breathing issue. That's not resolved, but she will outgrow it. Second, she has to be able to regulate her own body temperature. For the last 24 hours she's been doing that, so we're happy about that at this point. And third, she has to take all of her feeds from a bottle. They start them small with that one, but she had her first bottle feed today and will get more and more every day.
So for right now, we are very encouraged with Emma's progress. The only issue, as I said, is the breathing. Once she gets that resolved and takes more food from a bottle, she will be well on her way to coming home. We are still taking this one day at a time. I know that sounds like a broken record, but we cannot allow ourselves to think too far ahead. But it's encouraging to see Emma beginning to exhibit the criteria required for discharge. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: 21 is our lucky number. Emma's dressed and eating from a bottle on the 21st of August.
Happy Birthday Mommy!! Your little girl had a pretty big day today! :-)
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