Our Little B

One of my favorite things about the nurses in the NICU is that they match Brooklyn's bows with her outfits:
Brooklyn got a visit from Grandpa Sant today. We thought it was really nice of him to drive out from Elko for a quick trip just to see Brooklyn. Thanks Grandpa!
Brooklyn is doing great. All she has to do is eat for 48 hours straight without using her feeding tube. We should hopefully have her home in a few days. She's finally getting this eating thing down-yea!!

Dear Brooklyn

Dear Brooklyn,

You are such a strong little girl. You have overcome many bumps already with just coming into this world 10 days ago. You have one more hurdle in front of you: eating. We know you can eat. You've showed us you can eat, and you even made a little progress today. Now you just have to be consistent and eat everything at every feeding without using your tube. We are trying to be patient, but we really want you to come home soon. We want to be able to enjoy you all the time. You are in a lot of people's prayers, including ours. We love you Little B and couldn't be more excited to welcome you into our family. Come home soon.

Love you,
Mom and Dad

1 Week or 3 Months?

I brought Brooklyn some clothes from home today....at just over a week old, size 3 months is what she is fitting into, and probably not for very long. It was so fun putting her own clothes on her, and I'm glad she doesn't have to lay in her bed with just a diaper and blankets on any more.

Little B's PICC line is still in, but they have taken out the sugar going into her, she is strictly on full feedings. They've kept the PICC line active just in case they need to end up using it again.

Little B is also in a little crib now. (She's too big for the little baby bucket beds.)

We are now working on Little B's sucking. We had a speech pathologist come in and look at some things with B this afternoon, yes, a speech pathologist. I had no idea the connections with eating and what a speech pathologist can help with. I'm not going to try and explain it because I would just confuse you. But I'll just say I was impressed with everything he was telling me, and it made sense. He gave me some great tips for helping Little B.

Little B also got to spend time with her Ama today. It's the first time Ama's got to see her since she was born because she's been at home keeping her cold germs to herself. (Thanks mom!!)

One Week

It's hard to believe that it has already been one week since Brooklyn was born. As much as I wish she was home with us right now, I'm so glad she has been well taken care of.

We got some good news today:
- She's off the Bilirubin lights, this means we get to hold her longer.
- Little B's PDA has closed.
- They couldn't rule out a Coarc from the Echo, but her blood pressure has stayed normal in her
upper and lower extremities. They will order another Echo before she is discharged.
- They're taking out Little B's PICC line tomorrow. She is strictly on full feedings now-that little girl
needs a lot to eat!
- Little B can come home when she is eating without the help of a tube! (Hopefully she'll start eating
better with her PICC line being out.)

Little B and Poppa

Little B got to spend some time with Poppa yesterday. She loves her poppa....I think he even got a few smiles out of her.

They will do Little B's heart Echo today and we should have results no later than tonight. Hopefully she will be completely off the bilirubin lights tomorrow as well.

She continues to melt my heart everyday. I keep reminding myself that each day she's in the NICU is one day closer to getting her home. We love you B!!

Staying Strong

Brooklyn's bilirubin count went back up this morning so she is back under the lights. The nurse also heard her heart murmur this morning. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, the nurse said the PDA can close and open. They have ordered the Echo to be done on her heart for Wednesday morning.

She was really lethargic this afternoon because of her bilirubin count. She wouldn't eat anything so they had to put her feeding tube back in. When we went back in tonight she was wide awake and we were able to get her to eat. She was back to her normal self tonight. I love that little one!

They did get B's PICC line in yesterday. It was originally supposed to go in through her arm, but because of her chubby little arms, they couldn't find a vein to put it through. They ended up starting it in her left foot and going up to her leg and it stops up by her waist. The PICC line is what they are now using to get the glucose into her system. They've taken out the line that was running through her umbilical cord, so now we don't have to worry about it being pulled out.

I love this little girl. She just gets cuter and cuter everyday!

Bittersweet

I woke up a little emotional this morning knowing that I got to go home, but our Brooklyn has to stay for a little while longer. But I got up, ate some breakfast, pumped and then headed down to the NICU to see if I could make it in time for Brooklyn's 9:00 feeding. Lucky enough for me, her nurse was running a little behind.

I took Little B's temperature, changed her diaper, and then here's the best part....The nurse asked if I wanted to try breast feeding her. I told her I didn't know if I was supposed to yet because they wanted to make sure she was getting a certain measured amount at each feeding while they wait to see if her PDA closes. Since I had just pumped, she said it would be ok and it would just give B the experience of latching on.

To make a long story short, I'm 90% sure Little B will do great at breast feeding, but she was so hungry at this point she didn't really want to have anything to do with it. She was on for a little bit and we tried some little tricks with the milk, but she was just too hungry. The good news is I can start doing this with her more. After she finished eating the nurse let me hold her for about 45 minutes with just that skin-to-skin contact. We had the best cuddle time together!

And another positive update: The nurse didn't hear Little B's heart murmur this morning!! This could potentially mean that her PDA has closed. They are going to run her Echo on either Wednesday or Thursday now to see if it has closed. Yea! My testimony of prayer and fasting continues to grow everyday. Thank you everyone, our prayers are being answered.