Raise your hand if...

Raise your hand if...
...you love your mommy and daddy...
...you're fond of pooping at night...
...you love to sleep on your belly...
...you think your nurses are the coolest...
...you want to play with the Servo i...
...you're getting 6 ml of milk now...
...your parents ate Chinese food, fell asleep on the couch and didn't wake up until 1 am...
...you're loved, adored and prayed for...
...you're a pretty girl!

Peanut Princess

Madeleine is doing well so far tonight yet very active...she's been all over the place with her sats...one minute she'll be low...the next minute high. She did just get 3 ml of food and a position change at 11 pm and is now *sorta* settling down. She's a wild girl, moving her arms and feet around...she's ALIVE, and she's strong for being such a petite Peanut.

She also did get a glycerin suppository because she hasn't pooped since her last "poop party" (4 times in one 24 hour span) a few days ago, so we're hoping for some messy diapers tonight. I changed her right before her feeding and it was soaked. They're planning on weaning her delta P vent setting down from 35 to 33 at 2 am. Hopefully she'll tolerate that and keep moving forward, I'm ready to get some snuggling going here!!! It's making this mommy very antsy!

Agitated

Madeleine behaved for her birthday...and then decided it was her party, she'd act up if she wanted to! In the evening, she was "agitated" and they sedated her, which didn't make me very happy at all. "Agitated" to me means irritated or annoyed...so I think...check the diaper, reposition her, suction the tube...but she was knocked out instead. I think it was just not explained to me in a way that I could feel ok with...the doctor that night was not easy to understand. I was afraid to ask a question, let alone a STUPID one for fear that we just weren't able to communicate well.

Long story short, this morning, her nurse explained that when she's "agitated"...it means rather that she could be in pain, have a headache, etc. The sedation helps her with the pain of the high frequency ventilator, and all the things that her body is doing that could cause her pain. She said that the ventilator can pain an adult, and so how much more would it pain lil' Peanut?! That made me feel better about the whole situation. She also said when we're "agitated", it means annoyed and the last thing we want is to be medicated! Exactly how I feel.

She is getting some red blood cells today, her little Peanutiness just can't make them well yet...she got platelets this morning. Her body is still "catching up" from when those platelets had to go assist the bleeds she had, or so I understand. They also said a need for platelets could be a sign of infection, but so far no infection has shown up. I remember little to NOTHING from biology class, I was too busy printing pictures to care...and a lot of it is just over my head and that's why I need it explained to me 10 times...unless someone shows me a picture of what is going on, I'm fairly lost.

There have been two peaks to my day...the first came when I stepped outside and found the most glorious package from Aunt MB...loaded with wonderful scripty notes and sweet gifts...how did she know that I'm allergic to practically everything except Clinique?! Fabulous. And, the second was when some nurses were saying how cute Madeleine was...of course I KNOW that...but it's great to hear other people say it...I just want everyone to adore her as much as I do, ya know?!

Peanut Gallery

Gratuitous Peanut pictures from this afternoon...





When we walked in the NICU tonight there were nurses, doctors and RT's with Madeleine. The Peanut is retaining a little water...they had to change her vent settings a bit and move her breathing tube in a bit. She grew and the vent tube is taped to her...so it was sitting a little high and possibly causing her some oxygenation problems. Feedings have stopped until they make sure she's on track again. They also gave her more hydrocortisone and won't be weening her off of that as quickly since it looks like she still needs it. Now we're wondering what the long term effects of being on that will be? It's a question for tomorrow.

It always seems like Peanut has a little "episode" right before her birthday...and it's less than 3 hours from her 1 month mile stone...I should have expected it! What was I thinking? She's been sailing along, doing great...that's always when it happens! I was going to go out and buy a pan for making madeleine's and whip those up...but it's 1:30 am...we'll see what tomorrow brings.

Update

Since I have no recent pictures of Madeleine, here's one of her patron saints instead!

Daddy and I visited Punkin last night and she was sleeping very soundly, making exercise now and then, but just resting and growing. This morning I called to check on her and the big news is that she pooped 3 TIMES in the night. Holy mackerel.

The funny part is...these 3 poops are now earing her 3 ml of milk...up from her 1 ml! With the increase of food, they'll decrease her TPN (Total Parenteral Nutrition). They've also stopped checking her blood so frequently and only do it once a day now which means less needles in the foot and she gets to keep more of her blood. She's only got so much you know!

Her last head ultrasound looked "unchanged" from previous ones which is good. Her ventricles are the same size meaning they're not swelling as the clot from her original bleed breaks up and gets reabsorbed in her body. Her last chest x-ray also showed her lungs being a little more uniform...even though they're still very premature.

Tomorrow, she'll be 1 month old...we will be celebrating that for sure...even though we celebrate everyday we get with her!

Getting bigger

Height - 13 3/4"
Weight - 2 lbs. 6.7 oz.
Age - will be 1 month on Wednesday, roughly 29 weeks gestational

The Punkin is such a HUGE girl now. At birth, she was 11" long and weighed 1 lb. 11 oz. I'm not sure what her head size was when she was born, but it's 9 1/2" now. She is still tolerating her feeds and they may increase them tomorrow since she has pooped twice now. The system is starting to function. They brought her nitric oxide down from 10 to 5...(she started at 20 ppm) and so far she's doing fine with that. I have to keep reminding myself that even though she's doing great...we've still got that "long road" ahead of us and she IS still in the intensive care unit. Eye exams will start in a few weeks

Peanut is as feisty as ever...she loves to sleep with her arms raised above her head which causes her not to oxygenate well. You can tuck her little hands in and she yanks them out and up over the head they go! I think this is genetic since both her mom and g-marms sleep like that! Silly Punkin. I'm going to have to buy her hard, plastic toys to hug on when she's older since her plastic vent tubes are her best friends right now...she's always "holding hands" with them!

In other news...

(Grandpa Brenner with Madeleine's mom painted like a clown by Madeleine's mom's mom!)

Madeleine's grandpa Brenner would have been 68 today. Happy Birthday G-pa, rest in peace. We're going to celebrate today with homemade stuffed squash made by our friend Miss Shab2 and some slices of cake purchased with "milk money" from the hospital's cafeteria!

Happy Easter

Wishing everyone a glorious Easter.
With love, Tim, Kim and Madeleine.

Let there be....

...POOP POOP POOP! The eagle has landed...and she did it all by herself! And the detailed report is in...it was soft and brown...a regular ol' BM. (Sorry, still no pics...the diaper wasn't saved this time!) She was just about to get a glycerin suppository...when..."PBBTTHTHTT". She must have heard and decided it was time!

The prettiest girl...

Look at the pretty pink bow! Madeleine's feeling very girly right now.

The new Peanut palace is in place, looks just like her original palace but a lot cleaner. This will help the Peanut fight infections that could grow from the high humidity her first week at Mercy, not to mention time and lots of hands and stuff going in and out of her palace. And will you look at the new bedding, the exact colors that her room will be! Violet and green.

She did really well with the switch, I, on the other hand, had to leave the room. It wasn't that it was horrible, I just didn't know what to visually expect and thought it best that I not watch. She's been a stable girl and has even been weened on her oxygen some, she's retaining a little water and they're helping her out with that...it seems that some things start to work well and something else will start to have a little problem, and back and forth. It's a constant tweaking with her. But she looks SO much better than she did 3 weeks ago...I looked back at old pictures and it's just amazing...they're really taking good care of my Peanut...she's so beautiful!

Madeleine's 1 ml of food per 6 hours is going down just fine, it's still not coming out the other end though! I imagine it will be one of those things where...once she starts...there will be no stoppin' it. That's ok, let 'er rip girl!

I still think Tim's ring would work as Madeleine's bracelet. It would be like one of those big, heavy bangles they used to wear in the 80's. Now all she needs is an acid washed onesie and a hot pink diaper and she's so IN. (Maybe some neon green leg warmers...and Cyndi Lauper on her walkman...nah, I don't remember the 80's...)

Making exercise

Peanut has...
her own dishes...

Madeleine has still been resting and has been a very good girl for her nurses lately. She still isn't fond of sleeping on her back...it appears that she's more awake on her back so maybe that's the cause of the desats and flailing arms! We call it "making exercise" after a lady that I used to work for at a gallery in Chicago...she would hard boil eggs and crack one on the counter. The dog would hear that and come running but she would never give the dog the egg until he "made exercise". She would hold the egg over his head and in her thick German accent she would say, "Make exercise!" and the dog would growl and spin around in circles until he earned the egg!

Madeleine is currently earing her 1 ml of milk every 6 hours...not nearly as fattening as a hard boiled egg...but probably tastes better. Her exercises are waving ( or so it seems), reaching all the way back and feel the vent tubes and licking on the ones in her mouth. She also found her mouth with her hand and "nommed" on that for a while. "Nom Nom Nom...tasty hand". She's been a squirmy little Peanut while on her back but loves when we "cup her" at the feet and top of the head...she feels contained...even big daddy did it for her tonight! She loves him.

Punkin gets a whole new bed tomorrow...she's been living in her current Peanut Palace for a little over 3 weeks. She gets a new one and it sounds like quite the manuever...I probably will not want to watch as I will fret and get in the way. I'll just have faith, say some prayers and leave it to the the pros! Maybe I'll distract myself at J.Jill buying an Easter outfit? Peanut would approve. I have to get it while I can...pretty soon there will be a new girl getting all the outfits!!