This morning I learned that Oliver had been moved from bed #1 to bed #25, and his current bed is in the special care (NSCU) rather than intensive care (NICU) unit. They made several changes to his care - one of which was to continue the room air trials and another was to discontinue his doses of caffeine. They started a room air trial right before I arrived today, and the whole 3.5 hours I was there he wasn't on any oxygen. He had some episodes where his satuation levels were too low and/or his respiration levels were too high, but overall he did very well. I was pleasantly surprised when I called to check on him at 8:30pm that he was still in room air! Wow! I'll be anxious to hear in the morning if they put the cannula back in his nose or not. In light of this improvement as well as starting to work on nursing, I asked that they move his feeding tube to his nose. It's currently going over his tongue. The first feeding session (noon) wasn't successful because he slept pretty much the entire time. I held him for 2 1/4 hours and then put him back in his isolette so I could go to the bathroom and pump again. When I got back, I noticed he was awake. I changed his diaper again and then decided to attempt feeding session #2 even though they hadn't started his feed yet, and they said they try to do it at the same time so the babies associate a full belly with nursing. I am glad I seized the moment because he did great! He latched on multiple times on both sides! He didn't last long, but it seemed like a big step forward. The plan is to do the same tomorrow and then start nursing him every 3 hours around the clock starting sometime on Wednesday, as he'll be 34 weeks that day (which is the earliest they encourage nursing at this NICU).
The best news of the day was when his doctor told me that another doctor will be taking over Oliver starting tomorrow and will be his doctor for the next two weeks. She told me that she expects that during that time Oliver will be discharged. It depends on Oliver, but that was very exciting to me! When he was born I was thinking - 4 weeks even though the other NICU said most likely 6 weeks. Maybe my 4 week estimate will be accurate as tomorrow he'll be 2 weeks old. It would be awesome if he could come home around Labor Day (about 4 weeks before his EDD). Today was the first time since 6pm last Tuesday that I had changed his diaper. Somewhere during that time span he got out of the merconium phase. His poop today was yellow and runny rather than black and tarry.
Last night I did a load of laundry and *thought* we did a load of dishes in case I would be checking into the Ronald McDonald House tomorrow. This morning it wasn't until I had put away about 80% of the dishes that I discovered Paul and I had a miscommunication last night, and he hadn't run the dishwasher. I had been putting dirty dishes into the cupboards. That was a mess to try to get the dirty ones back into the dishwasher. I also went through some boxes in Nadia and Ian's closets to put some fall clothes into their dresser drawers (ex. pants). I also went through Nadia's clothes and took some of her spring/summer items to the basement (particularly any that were size 3T). Ian wore size 24 month pants for the first time today. He's definitely shorter than Nadia was because when she was his age she was wearing 24m pants, but I had to roll the waistband for his pants to fit him, and he'll be 3 years old in 4 months! I thought it was time for him to move past size 18 month (for pants - he's been wearing 24m/2T for everything else for several months). This is the time of year when the weather is constantly changing and one needs to have access to a variety of articles of clothing.
A young woman from church (who is an early childhood major at my university) watched the kids today for 5 hours and will watch them again tomorrow during the same time span. She's really nice, but the two main reasons I don't prefer that the kids go to her house too much are #1 her idea of babysitting is to let them watch Disney movies for hours on end and #2 they have a few cats (and a dog) and both kids are sneezing and rubbing their eyes by the end of the day. Paul's parents are going to watch the kids on Wednesday and Thursday, and they'll go to Sarah's house on Friday.
They used to give nursing moms one meal pass a day at this hospital, but they don't do that any more. They are still doing that at the hospital in Harrisburg. I used a $5 pass on Monday and Tuesday in the cafe last week. However, if I will be staying at the Ronald McDonald House (which costs $15 a night), I should be able to get some free meals there. I can't wait until life settles back into "normal" here at home. I told the woman who brought us dinner tonight that Oliver should be coming home soon. I said we could make this week the last week for meals, but she said she already has the meals lined up for next week so we'll make next week the last week. I am so very grateful for all the ways my church family has helped us out over the past 10 weeks!
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