Nov 9, 2009

Day 37
Reese weighs 3lbs 3oz and Riley weighs 3lbs.

Both are doing really good! They took Riley's nasal canula out of her nose!!! What a big day for her. Now we can see her face so much better. I will try and take a picture and post it tomorrow night. Reese was weaned down on her vapo therm from 2.5 to 1.5. We hope tomorrow they wean her even more. Shouldn't be long and she will be off her flow too. Next step for the girls is bolus feedings. Right now they have a tube in their nose for their feedings. They are fed every 4 hours. The milk is pushed with a pump over a 2 hour period then they rest for 2 hours to digest then feed again. The transition will be pretty quick. They will push their milk for 1 1/2 hours for 2 feedings, then they will start feeding them every 3 hours pushing the milk over 30 mins. Then they will move to bolus feeding. The milk will still be given to them through the tube, they will not use the pump. They will hold the syringe up and gravity will make the milk flow. It will go into their stomachs in about 20 minutes as if they were sucking on a bottle but not burning the calories. After that, they will rotate pump feeding, bolus feeding and work in a bottle feeding. So maybe they will start bottle feeding within the next couple of weeks. The girls are keeping their body temps up on their own. Being in the same bed and next to each other seems to help. So, from our experience with Conor these are the things he had to do before he could come home: 1. Breath on his own 2. Keep his body temp up 3. Bottle feed and gain weight......I think we are on the right track. Coming home by Christmas may not be out of reach!