Visions in Pink

It's official...Mommy put us in our first matching outfits today.  It was our first day in real clothes from home.  Mommy doesn't think its fair she already has to start doing our laundry - but like everything else that happens in the NICU, it's good practice.

Today Emerson got a bath and the nurse taught Mommy how so that she can do it the next time.  We get a bath every three days.  Here is Emerson getting a shampoo.

Mommy got to change us into our outfits and swaddle us back in our beds before she left for the day.  She held me for a while too, our first snuggle with no CPAP.   She rocked me fast to sleep and loved hearing all the cute noises I make (which she couldn't before under the whir of the CPAP).

We are both doing really well off of our CPAPs.  Emerson had a few bradys last night, but she didn't have any today that she couldn't pull herself out of and the nurse thinks maybe her feeding tube was the issue.  The doctor is going to increase her caffeine a little bit tonight to see if that helps too.  She pulled out her feeding tube this morning so now it is in her nose.  Mine will go in my nose the next time I pull mine out too (or after a week, whichever comes first).  

We had our eye tests today to check for retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) which can happen if the immature blood vessels in our eyes don't form correctly.  So far our eyes look good, but the doctors will check again in three weeks since they still have a little developing to do.  Emerson also had her follow up brain scan, all clean!  Mine should be next week.

Both of our feeds continue to increase.  We are almost at our goal feeding rate, which is about 8.8ml an hour.  Once we reach that, we move onto bolus feeds which means we get the same amount of food, but rather than a continuous feed, they start giving it to us in batches, more like normal eating.  First, they will spread 27ml over 2 hours, then over an hour, then over 30 minutes every three hours.  Right now our breathing is a little fast, but once it slows down and becomes more steady, we can start bottle or breastfeeding.  If we tried to drink from a bottle right now, there's a chance we could aspirate our milk which would be bad.