W3-D2 In the Middle of the Night

So, on Tuesday, Barbara got up even earlier, for the 6:30/7:30 AM feedings.  She figured that since we now knew we were going home soon, that we needed to be able to handle the feedings around the clock.  Since I was already doing the 12:30/1:30 AM shift, she would get up earlier to try to handle the early shift.  We weren’t sure what we’d do about the 3:30/4:30AM shift when we got home, but we were getting closer.

On Tuesday, we found that Spencer had taken his first full 59 ml meal that morning.  And he was becoming more and more regular, eating at least 50ml for each meal.  The chief neonatologist came to us and told us that despite what the other doctor had mentioned about staggering the discharges of the boys, he had reviewed the cases and was recommending that the boys be discharged together either on Wednesday or Thursday and that they had started discharge procedures.  We then spent the day getting ready.  For instance, both boys had to be tested in the car seat.  Ordinarily they tested the babies for an hour and a half to make sure that their vitals did not drop out of the safe range.  In our case, because of the distance to home, they ran the test for 3 hours, just to be safe.  Both boys passed (actually, they did Dexter’s on Monday and Spencer’s on Tuesday).  They did hearing tests on the boys.  With our concurrence, they gave the boys Hepatitis-B vaccines.  There were several videos that we had to watch before the boys were released including one on SIDS, one on Shaken Baby Syndrome, and one on caring for your baby.  We were able to watch these while feeding the babies, so it wasn’t too bad, although the video on Shaken Baby Syndrome was pretty jarring—to me, it seemed the idea was the scare the daylights out of first-time parents to make sure they were too scared to ever do that to a baby.  L  But, all in all, we got through a lot of what needed to be done.

So, on Tuesday afternoon, we decided to take a break.  We had been told about the local street fair that was this town’s annual big event.  It was a five day street fair where they closed a significant portion of the main street through town and set up a HUGE fair.  It is the largest street fair in the state.  We were told that we should visit it since we were in town and see what it was all about.  We went and had the local “specialty” sandwich and, since, we were in Pennsylvania Dutch country, we treated ourselves to a funnel cake.  Yum!  We wandered the fair for about an hour and then headed back to the hospital.

Barbara went to bed early so that she could get up again for the 6:30/7:30 AM feedings.  When I went in for the 9:30/10:30 PM feedings, I had just gotten through changing and feeding Dexter but had not yet burped him.  It was about 10:15.  The nurse on duty got a phone call.  It was pediatrics calling.  It turns out that there were three juvenile patients in the ER who would require admission to the hospital and there were only two empty rooms.  That meant that we would have to vacate the room.  And of all nights, the one night that the local hotel was booked up.  We weren’t sure what we were going to do, but the nurse on duty stopped me and told me that there were two open rooms in maternity and they were not expecting anyone that evening, so one room should be enough for emergencies and we could move into one of the two empty rooms.  So I had to go and wake Barbara up and once again, we packed up quickly and moved back from pediatrics to maternity.  Again, it astounded us that the hospital staff would bend over backwards so much to accommodate us when they were busy dealing with patients. It took about an hour to pack up, move, and settle back in in the new room.  But, I was done with about an hour and a half to spare before the 12:30 AM feeding cycle began.  On the plus side, both boys ate well and continued to gain weight.  I seem to have gotten off a day on the weights.  The weights for their last night were Dexter 6 lbs, 4.9 oz (up 7.4 oz since birth) and Spencer 6 lbs, 7.7 oz (up 7.2 oz since birth).

W3-D1 Together Forever

[Sorry for the long delay in posting—as you’ll see in the next few blog posts, a lot happened to us very quickly and I have not been able to find the time to update the blog, but I’ll try to get the info up here as soon as possible.  –Ted.]

The boys are two weeks old today and doing better and better every day.  Today, we decided to try to skew our schedules a little more so that when we go home, we’ll be able to spread out the feedings and care of the boys between us (when we no longer have the wonderful staff of NICU nurses to take the night-time feedings and changings).  So, Barbara got up earlier and went for the 9:30/10:30 AM shift.  When she went in, she got a pleasant surprise, which I also got when I came in around 11:00 AM.  Spencer had been able to regulate his body temperature enough to move to a regular crib.  It was such a joy to see both boys out of the incubators and into normal cribs.  It is just one more sign that they are getting closer to being able to come home with us.  In fact, one of the nurses figured that once they were both in cribs and out of the incubators, she had another surprise for us.  She went to the Pediatrics department and brought over a large crib so that she could move the boys together and co-habitate them.  It was so comforting to us to see our boys together in the same bed.  Every day another step towards bringing them home.  So, the boys have gotten to spend their last few days in the hospital NICU together.  The best thing is that even when one is screaming bloody murder, it doesn’t seem to disturb the other one who sleeps through it.

Dexter had a few surprises in store for us.  At the 6:30PM feeding, Dexter drank the full bottle (60 ml) and was still hungry and trying to drink.  So we gave him another bottle and he drank another 9 ml, for a total of 69 ml.  Wow!  And then at 9:30 PM, he drank 67 ml.  Especially considering how long it took for him to start, he’s been making up for lost time, this week.  He followed that up with 76 at the 12:30 feeding.  And he weighed 6 lbs, 5.6 oz, up 2.8 oz.  He’s growing at a good rate and doing very well.

Spencer continues to make progress.  He’s actually eating 46-52 ml most of the time.  He’s also gained weight and now weighs 6 lbs, 7.2 oz (up 1.3 oz). 

We got an interesting surprise.  When we came to the NICU this morning, the head nurse informed us that she had scheduled our first well-baby checkup with our pediatrician for us for Friday.  That was a surprise.  It meant that we’d be home by Friday, something we were not sure of before this.  After lunch, when the neonatologist came by, he had another surprise for us.  He said that Dexter was doing well and was about ready to be discharged perhaps as early as the next day, Tuesday.  Spencer had made great progress but might need an extra day or two since he wasn’t eating reliably enough to be discharged.  The staff was very pleased with how stable his breathing and temperature regulation were, but just wanted to make sure that he was eating enough on his own.  He still had a feeding tube in his nose, and he was taking at least part of his meals almost every time.  But, he was making progress.

We were kind of hoping that Dexter was not being released on Tuesday because otherwise we’d have no place to stay locally and would have to take him further away from the hospital for the night, but at least we had provisioned ourselves on our quick trip home with supplies to take care of Dexter.

Week 2 – Never on a Tuesday

At 13 days old, the boys are coming along well.  The progress is steady and pretty good.   As I’m a little behind on the blog entries, some of the details of Sunday are a bit of a blur.

We had a few key milestones on Sunday.  For the first time, we were told that we were getting close to discharging the boys.  The doctor on duty was quite pleased with Dexter’s progress and said that he was likely to be discharged either Tuesday or Wednesday depending on how consistently he ate his meals and that he continued to gain weight.  Spencer was still a little behind and so it was looking like we were going to be taking Dexter to the local Hampton Inn for a day or two until Spencer was ready to be discharged.  We’re currently staying in the Pediatric unit and the nurses reminded us that this was a ward with sick kids and we shouldn’t be exposing our newborns to that environment.  We had brought supplies from home with us on Saturday for just this eventuality, but it still wasn’t going to be convenient.  The logistics were going  to be challenging and Barbara would probably have to stay in the hotel with Dexter while I shuttled back and forth to the hospital to care for Spencer and get us food, etc.  But, we’ve learned to take one day at a time and cope with whatever happens.  Now, this week is the local town’s biggest annual event, their street fair which is a large 5 day festival (Tuesday-Saturday).  So, I called the local Hampton Inn to check on hotel availability if we needed to move there.  Of course, they were booked Tuesday and Saturday nights (the first and last nights of the fair).  It’s strange that this small town’s hotel is booked on back-to-back Tuesdays.  Well, we just hoped that things would work out.  If not, there were a few hotels slightly further out, just much less convenient.  While talking with the desk clerk at the Hampton Inn, she informed me that there was a hospital rate for anyone visiting a relation in the hospital.  It was $40 per night less.  That was nice to hear.  I mentioned that we hadn’t heard of that when we were there the previous week.  She actually looked up our reservation and credited my credit card with the difference between the rate we paid and the discount rate.  Wow!  Good customer service.  Although Barbara did point out that we had described our situation to the desk clerk the night we checked in and that clerk obviously did not know about the discount because she did not offer it to us.  But, it was still really nice to get the refund.  And $45 per night (after taxes) is a significant amount of money and can add up if you need multiple nights.

As for the boys, Dexter continued to become more consistent with his feedings.  Although he had had many larger feedings meeting his current target amount (55 ml per feeding), he wasn’t doing it consistently.  He’s eaten 50-55 ml of formula about 6 times out of 8 meals in a day.  But the other two meals are generally about 35 ml.  While there isn’t a daily quota, he needs to eat enough to ensure that he continues to gain weight, which fortunately he has been doing.  Today he measured 6 lbs, 5.6 oz, or up 2.8 oz from yesterday.  A good gain.  Also, Dexter was stable enough for the hospital to do a car seat test.  They put the baby into the car seat for 1.5 hours and watch the body monitors to ensure that the baby can handle sitting for extended periods of time in the car seat without a change in factors (such as heart rate, blood oxygen saturation level and blood pressure).  In our case, because we live more than 1.5 hours away, they do the car seat test for 3 hours.  Dexter passed.

Spencer’s big news is that while he has not matched his big 51 ml feeding from yesterday, he has increased the average amount he takes each feeding.  Before today, he had averaged about 10-20 ml.  Now, he averages about 30-35 ml per feeding.  Big improvement.  And he also continues to gain weight.  Spencer weighed  6 lbs, 7.2 oz, up 1.3 oz from yesterday.

W2-D6 Shop ‘til You Drop

So, when we first thought about the fall consignment sale, we had some general ideas of what we’d want and need, to take care of the babies.  And has that changed.  After a week and a half of caring for them, we have a much better idea of what we’d need.  We knew how much we’d need receiving blankets and burp cloths, we just didn’t realize how many we’d need.  We had thought we’d need/want about a dozen, but we now know we want more (more like 2-3 dozen).  We weren’t sure what we’d want to dress them in, but now we figure we’ll dress them in a lot of the sleep-n-play outfits, so we’ll get more of those.

After a very short night, we got up and got out to the consignment sale.  We showed up right at 7:15 and there was already a line of about a dozen people.  But, because we were club members, we got to go right in and not wait.  Boy, it was a good thing that members got to shop for 45 minutes from 7:15-8:00 before the public gets let in.  We managed to snag a lot of things (including one of the best swings and some SuperYard fencing units) plus some supplies (receiving blankets, burp cloths, and regular blankets) before the doors opened.  We were shopping and not paying attention, but there was no doubt when 8:00 AM rolled around.  Suddenly this wave of humanity washed into the room and the room which had a slight buzz of discussion was filled with a big burst of background noise, talking and mayhem.  We left at 9:30 and managed to get quite an impressive haul of things that will really help us care for our boys.  But, after getting home, sorting the “take” and putting a load of items into the laundry, we discovered that despite this big haul, we had managed to forget to buy newborn-size sleepers, one of the big items on our list.  So, we trundled back out to the sale and got there at 11:00 AM.  We were still able to pick up a lot of sleepers and other clothing items we’ll need.

We also picked up some blankets, onesies, sleepers, caps and burp clothes for the NICU.  We now know how many they’ll go through.  Our boys have pretty much outgrown premie clothes and are ready for newborn clothes, but the NICU can use premie clothing.  Additionally, they need a mixture of boy and girl clothing, so we got a nice haul of stuff to take back to the hospital with us and it was really inexpensive and only gently used.

Now, while we were at the consignment sale, I got a call from our alarm system company.  Apparently the motion detector in our kitchen had gone off.  When we got home, we figured out why.  Our sister-in-law had kindly sent us some flowers and balloons congratulating us on the birth of the boys.  We brought them home and left them on the kitchen table…a little too close to the vent in the kitchen.  After a little while, the air currents blew the balloons around triggering the motion detector.  Well, those balloons found a new home elsewhere!

We ran a few other errands, came home, finished up most of our task list (of over 30 items on the list, we only ended up with a couple that didn’t get finished), then packed ourselves back up and headed back to Pennsylvania.  We managed to get there about 10 minutes before Dexter’s dinner-time feeding.  Whew…gotta get used to the boys putting us on a schedule!  J

So, we came in to find some wonderful news.  Dexter had been stable for long enough they had moved him into a regular crib and out of the incubator.  Yeah!  And the nurse said he had drunk a full bottle (59 ml) for 3 of the last 4 feedings.  He’s starting to eat more and all by himself.  They had even decided that he was stable enough that they removed his feeding tube from his nose.  The doctor had instructed the nurses that if he pulled the tube out, to just leave it out.  The little stinker pulled it out within about 30 minutes, so it stayed out (he must have been eavesdropping on the doctor’s conversation with the nurse).  Barbara fed him, but he would only take about 36 ml so he was still not eating consistently, but when we left, 36 was high and now 36 was low for him.  Spencer was also making good progress.  When we left, his incubator was set at 32.5 C.  When we returned, it was down to 30 F and he was maintaining his body temperature much better.  He wasn’t getting cold as quickly.  He had also started feeding himself more regularly.  He actually took 18 ml from us (the highest he has eaten on his own to date).   And apparently, he is eating about 1/3 to 1/2 of the time instead of like once per day (1/8 feedings).    But, all in all, great progress from both of them.

We found out that the boys were scheduled for a bath that day.  The nurses were going to wait and let us bathe the boys, but the afternoon nurse said that Dexter was so stinky (our words, not hers) that she didn’t want to wait.  Since this is the second time that he’s needed a bath earlier than scheduled, I think we may be bathing him more frequently than Spencer.   I did come back and gave Spencer a bath at 9:30 and then another big surprise…Spencer ate  51 ml of formula…by George, I think he’s got it.

I came back at 12:30 and Dexter did better.  He drank about 46 ml of formula. Which is pretty good.  However, he needs to consistently drink about 400 ml of formula a day and he’s really not up to that level yet.  However, he is doing well in gaining weight.  Thursday, he weighed 5 lbs, 15.1 oz.  And tonight he weighed  6 lbs, 2.8 oz.  So, in 2 days, he gained 3.7 oz. which is pretty incredible.  Spencer has also been doing well.  Thursday night Spencer weighed 6 lbs, 2.9 oz.  On Saturday he weighed 6 lbs, 5.9 oz.  So Spencer gained 3 oz in 2 days.  Additionally, both boys measured 19.5” in length.  Dexter was 19” at birth, so has gained  0.5” in length.  Spencer was 18.75” in length and has gained 0.75”.  So they’re growing well.  Once we get them eating well, we’ll find out when we can take them home.

So after feeding Dexter, the two long days with only 3.5 hours of sleep caught up to me and I apologized to the nurse on duty and did not stay to feed Spencer.  Oh well…gotta take advantage of them being there when I can.  Pretty soon, it will just be us.

W2.D5 On The Road Again

Sorry for the lack of blog entries, but it’s been a hectic few days and we’ve been short on sleep.  So, the last couple of times that I might have worked on blog entries, I napped.

Friday was such a hectic day.  We were planning on going home after the mid-afternoon feedings, so we shifted our schedule earlier to get in three visits with the boys.  So, we went for the 9:30 AM feedings and were shocked when Dexter drank 41 ml of formula and only had to take 14 ml of formula by NG.  This is the most that he’s drunk in any one meal.  We were not too hopeful for Spencer as he had not drunk anything either of the feedings in the morning.  But, he surprised us by drinking 11 ml.  It’s not much, but since he’s a couple of days behind Dexter and doing what his brother was doing then, drinking anything is an accomplishment.

After an early lunch, Dexter continued to improve his consistency by drinking 30 ml of formula.  This was the first time that he had had two back-to-back feedings over 30 ml.  We also heard from the doctors that they expected Dexter to be out of the incubator and into a normal crib very soon since he was doing better and better with his temperature.  That would be one step closer to being discharged from the hospital.  Spencer wasn’t very awake and it wasn’t surprising that he didn’t really make any progress.  He drank about 6 ml, but ver y slowly.  However, he was getting slightly better at regulating his body temperature.  They had lowered his incubator temp to 32.5 C.  Small steps, but at least steps in the right direction.

After the 3:30/4:30 feeding, we quickly bundled up out things and headed on the road again to get home.  We finally got on the road about 6:00 and with one stop for dinner, we managed to get home at 9:00 PM.  We spent about half of the trip discussing the various things that we were going to need to get done at home.    We wrote up a check-list that ended up being over 30 tasks that we needed to do.  We spent the first 20-30 minutes at home doing a tour and check of the house.  We hadn’t been home in nearly two weeks and had heard of major storms and flooding in the area.  But, no signs of any flooding, leaks or issues.  We started working on the chores and managed to get about 2/3 of them done by around 2:00 AM.

It was really, really nice to be home and sleep in our own beds, but I missed the boys already and we had only been away from them for about 8 hours.  I resisted the urge to call the hospital and  check up on how the boys were doing (although when we got back on Saturday, the nurse on duty said that I should have just called).  J  

W2.D4 - Day by Day

I know that it may sound a little odd, but one of the side problems of being in the NICU is dry skin…and I mean, REALLY dry skin.  Every time you go into the NICU, before you can touch anything, you have to scrub your arms with antiseptic surgical soap  FOR THREE MINUTES.  Now, 3 minutes may not seem that long, until you have to scrub your hands and arms up to the elbows for 3 minutes with soap, and a little scrub brush (they have disposable sponge/scrub brushes that you have to use).  Every time you go in.  We go in 5-6 times a day.  And with that much soap and water, your skin gets really dry.  As the nurses say, by the time we go home, we’ll have no skin on our arms.

So, on Thursday, we had our weekly meeting with the neonatologist.  He reviewed the case with us, which was pretty much as we knew.  The boys had progressed very well and were healthy babies about normal for their gestational age (36 weeks, 1 day).  At this point, neither had any outstanding health issues and were just trying to achieve the milestones needed to be discharged.  Dexter was getting quite close to being able to move out of the incubator bed.  His bed temperature had been lowered to 29 C (about 85 F) and he was still able to maintain his body temperature of 37 C.  Pretty soon, once he reaches 28 C and can still maintain his body temperature, he’ll be able to be moved to a crib instead of the incubator.  Dexter was still only eating about 14-15 ml of formula per feeding orally.  He is currently at 52 ml (FYI, 30 ml = 1 oz) and needs to be able to eat all of that from the bottle before he can be discharged.  He’s getting there.  About once per day he eats over 20 ml, but normally it’s about 15.  Spencer is still not ready to be moved out of the incubator.  His bed temperature was just lowered to 32.5 C and he can maintain his body temperature for brief periods, but not for an extended period of time.  Another few days and he’ll probably be able to do it.  Spencer is only really eating himself about once every four feedings or so (1-2 times per day).  And he averages about 10 ml when he eats.  The rest of the time, he doesn’t really try and just gets fed via NG tube.  When we asked the doctor to give us a ballpark estimate of how long we might need to wait for them to learn, he said it could be as little as 2-3 days (very unlikely) or probably about a week.  We expect that it will be around the end of next week when we get to bring them home.

We’re already working on planning for when we bring the boys home.  When we go in, we each take one baby and do the work.  We try to alternate which baby we take care of so that we both get a lot of bonding time with each boy.  When we get back from our quick trip home, we’ll probably try to alternate visits and each of us take a full 2 hour shift and then take the next one off to try to give ourselves a break and simulate when we are back at home, especially on the days when only one of us is home.  When we go back to work initially, we’ll be going back part-time with me working Mon, Wed and Fri and Barbara working on Tue and Thur until Thanksgiving so that one of us can stay at home until the boys are about 3 months old.  Then we’ll start child care for them.

So, we’ve let the maternity unit know our schedule and we plan to shift a little earlier tomorrow and do the 9:30/10:30 AM through 3:30/4:30 PM shift as I detailed yesterday.  Although it means another 2+ hour drive to get home, it will be nice to get away even for a day and to return home and sleep in our own bed.  But, it will mean a short night to get everything we need to get done and get up early enough to be in Columbia by 7:15 AM.

So, I went to the 10:30 PM feeding/caring for Spencer and found out that at 9:30, Dexter had drunk 36 ml of formula on his own.  Wahoo!  I expect him to poop out on me (perhaps a bad choice of words!) and not drink much at 12:30, but who knows, maybe he’ll surprise me.  As for Spencer, the last two feedings, he had not really drunk much of anything, so I decided with the nurse to not even try (although he seemed wide awake) and give him a break and  try him at 1:30 PM.

At 12:30 AM, Dexter actually took 26 ml more!  I can’t believe that he actually managed two of his biggest feedings back to back.  Dexter weighed in at 5 lbs, 15.1 oz so he gained 0.7 oz.  He’s still growing.  Spencer started off much as before, just kind of playing with the bottle for about 10 minutes.  But then, with a little nudging he started to drink and drink a lot.  He ended up drinking 17 ml of formula which is a big achievement.  This is like Dexter from two nights ago.  Hopefully Spencer will catch on in a couple of days.  What a great little bonus at the end of the night.  Spencer did lose a little weight and weighed 6 lbs, 2.9 oz, down about 0.9 or 1.5 oz depending on if you use the first or second measurement that night.  But as we were told with Dexter, when they just start feeding on their own, they do sometimes have a little drop in  weight before it goes back up.   

Well, just day by day, but today we made better progress than many days.

W2.D3 Getting the Hang of It

Well, we had hoped to be home with the boys by today.  Our original estimate had this as the day that my parents were going to come to visit.  But by last Thursday, we knew that this was no longer reasonable.  I had purchased tickets for my parents to come up to stay with us, and this past weekend, I had to call Southwest Airlines to try and adjust their flights.  When I explained the situation to the airlines, the customer service agent was very sympathetic and canceled my parents’ flights and gave us full credit for their tickets with no cancellation penalty.  I was stunned.  What airline these days doesn’t charge you a penalty for changing/canceling a flight?  But she put a credit into the system under each of their names for which we can just apply those funds to the tickets when we can actually schedule their visit.  MAJOR kudos to Southwest Airlines for their great customer service.  We are already devoted Southwest Airlines fans and pretty much will only fly SWA.  This just makes us bigger fans.

So, we went back to the Pennsylvanian breakfast joint and they were hopping.  Amazing what good homemade home cooking can do.  They had homemade sausage that they make themselves that was out of this world.  We also tried something we had never heard of before that turned out to be incredibly good—baked oatmeal.   It doesn’t sound that appetizing,  but it’s pretty good.  Imagine oatmeal seasoned just right and cooked into basically a quick bread (like a banana bread) and served with a little brown sugar and milk.  Wow…it was good.  I suspect my mother-in-law will love it and have to look for a recipe to try this out for when she comes to visit her new grandchildren.

Once again (this is becoming habit), we showed up at 12:30 to find good news about the boys.  Now one reason that we tend to keep the schedule that we keep is that the doctors come in every morning around 9:00 AM and evaluate all the NICU babies and decide on changes.  Then the staff bustle around putting those new orders into place.  The NICU is very busy in the mornings and sometimes hectic and chaotic and it’s much easier on the hospital staff not to have parents visiting then.  This is why we often have good news when we finally show up at lunch time .  So, today, we found that they were so pleased with Spencer’s condition that they had removed his IV’s.  He was no longer on any supplemental IV nutrition and was getting all of his nutrition from the formula feeding.  Yeah!  Now, he was down to only the monitoring cables and the feeding tube, essentially just like Dexter.  Another step forward.  Additionally, Dexter was getting better at regulating his body temperature and the environmental settings on his isolette bed was down to 29.5 C.  Getting closer every day.   The doctors have also decided that Spencer was stable enough that we should try bottle feeding him anytime that he was wide awake and alert at feeding time rather than only once per nurse’s shift.  And the doctors are just a please with his progress as we are.

So today, both boys needed baths.  They give each baby a bath every 3 days, but Dexter had only gone 2 days but you could definitely smell that he needed a bath.  So, we again scheduled the baths for between the boys bottle feedings, e.g. 3:30/4:30 PM.   We both gave Dexter his bath and then I sat down to hold Dexter and give him his NG feeding while Barbara bathed Spencer all by herself.  She did a great job of it.  

However, he was definitely not ready to bottle feed so we left it at that.  We got a little rest including Barbara getting a very short nap and then went back for the 6:30/7:30 feeding.  Unfortunately, the bath had worn out the boys.  They don’t like getting a bath, so they squall using up energy.  Additionally, while they are getting their bath (essentially a sponge bath), between sponging and drying, they expend a lot of energy keeping their body temperature at a reasonable level.  It still chills them down and even once they are back in the incubators, it takes a while before they come back up to 37 C.  They both fall right to sleep after a bath (hopefully we’ll be able to use this to help set a night time routine for them when they’re slightly older).  But even a couple of hours later, they still were pretty tired and so didn’t feed themselves too well at 6:30/7:30.  Dexter took about 14 ml of formula and Spencer only about 5 ml.  Oh well, we’ll see what it’s like later.  It was very nice when one of the nurses who had helped us several times over the last couple of weeks commented that we were really getting the hang of the baby care and that she thought that we were going to be able to manage quite well on our own. 

We were exhausted so we went out for dinner, then came back and we skipped the 9;30/10:30 feedings.  Barbara got to bed early and Ted caught up on the backlog of blog entries (including this very one). 

So, looking forward, this Saturday is our local Mother’s of Multiples club fall consignment sale.  After this last week and a half, we know a lot more of the supplies and such that we’ll need to take care of the boys.  So, on Friday, we’re going to shift our schedule and go to the 9:30/10:30 AM feedings through the 3:30/4:30 PM feedings.  Then we’re going to get in the car and head home.  We’ll check on the house, unpack and repack different clothes, etc and get ourselves ready to return.  On Saturday morning, we’ll go to the sale from 7:15-8:00 which is the members-only shopping period.  Then there is open shopping from 8:00-11:30.  They close from 11:30-12:00 when they relabel items and reopen from 12:00-1:00 when select remaining items are half price.  We’ll shop, bring out finds home then come back up here for the 6:30-7:30 feedings.  It will be a nice break, a chance to check on the house and to sleep in our own bed.

I went to the 12:30/1:30 AM feeding for the boys and was regaled with an amusing (after the fact) story.  Apparently, Spencer was getting changed at 10:30 when he let lose with the mother of all explosive bursts.  There is a small porthole on the end of the isolette which is normally used to thread various cables through.  When not in use, they put the latex cover over it, but since Spencer had until just yesterday had a lot of IV and such tubes going through, they had not yet covered it up.  Well, Spencer managed to not only give the explosive burst which covered the inside of his isolette, but he got right out through that porthole and covered the wall outside the bed.  The wall with all of the NICU equipment such as oxygen, the humidifier, etc.  The nurse who was about to get off shift at 11:00 got to spend almost an hour cleaning everything.  While I feel bad for the nurse (she’s a really nice one, too), I was so glad that we were not there for this big event in our son’s developing childhood.  I’m sure he’ll give us many memories of our own, but I’m glad that he spared us this one.   So, despite Barbara having given him a great bath, he was really in need of a second bath and ended up with two baths in one day. 

So, Dexter did good.  He weighed in at 5 lbs, 14.4 oz which means that he has passed his birth weight (which was actually 5 lbs, 13.8 oz).  Hooray!  And he also drank 17 ml for me before giving up and having the remainder fed.  He’s still keeping to the 11-25 ml range for feeding on his own…hopefully in the next few days, he’ll increase that.  Spencer weighed in at 6 lbs, 3.8 oz (6 lbs 4.4 oz right after his explosive burst) so he’s still over birth weight and is about 2.2 oz above two nights ago, which seems about right.  My guess is that different nurses are doing something different to get these numbers.  Spencer was pretty tired after two baths and the excitement that he had created, so he once again acted like “What is this thing in my mouth?” and didn’t drink on his own, but then we weren’t too surprised.  Ah well, two steps forward, one step back.  He’s still made huge progress over the last week.