No More Incubator

As of Monday the 22nd, Aimée is no longer in her incubator. She spends her days bundled up in nice warm blankets waiting to be cuddled by her mommy and daddy. She is now 4 pounds and 13 ounces and is working very hard to get all her feeds by bottle (60 ml). Once she has the bottles down she has to do a car seat trend test and then will be able to come home!

   Aimée's new digs!

Cuddling with her Daddy

Cant forget about Mommy

Aimée's room is also just about done just need to get some more storage for all the clothes everyone keeps buying her.

Hopefully the next update will be all about Aimée's big arrival at home.

4 Pounds

Aimee is now 4 pounds. 4 more ounces and she will have doubled her birth weight. She now eats between 48 and 52 mL every 3 hours. She is now allowed to have up to 3 bottles per day. Hopefully that helps her learn how to drink from the bottle faster.

They discontinued her caffeine and human milk fortifier today. Once she is off caffeine for 5 days, she will be able to come off all the monitors.

Bath/Bottle/Eye Exam

Yesterday they showed us how to give Aimee a bath. She was surprisingly a lot more calm than we thought she was going to be. She cried a bit, but when the nurse put her in the water and was splashing water over her, she calmed down. She didn't seem to like it when the nurse washed her hair. Her next bath, we should get to do. 

She did good with the bottle yesterday. She got 19 mL out of it before she decided that was enough and went to sleep. The other 16 mL had to be fed through the tube. She knows how to drink out of the bottle, but she hasn't quite learned how to breathe properly while eating. She stops eating and will breathe fast for a few seconds and then go back to eating. The nurse said that's normal. She hasn't quite got suck/swallow/breathe yet. The nurse yesterday said that babies sometimes don't fully get that until 37 weeks. Aimee is just about 35 weeks. That is the number of weeks pregnant I would have been had I still been pregnant. 

Aimee went for her first eye exam this morning. Mike called a little while ago and they said she is back and everything looked ok. I am sure I will get more information when I go visit her in a couple of hours. I will update later today or tomorrow with that information. They are doing a follow-up eye appointment next Tuesday. 

As of yesterday, Aimee was 3 pounds 11.5 ounces. 8.5 more ounces until she has doubled her birth weight. She's getting a chubby little belly. She is also getting very long. I was going to buy some sleepers and onesies off someone that are 3-5 pounds, but because she is growing so fast I decided not to. Her feet are pretty much right at the end of these sleepers so if she keeps getting so long and growing so fast she will be into the 5 pound sleepers pretty soon. It's much easier to find those in stores than 3-5 pound. 

Aimee is 5 weeks old today. 

Her first matching outfit

After her bath

Holding her after her bath and feed

Sunday October 7

Aimee is growing a lot this week. She is up to 3 pounds 9.5 ounces. She gained 6.5 ounces in the last week. The bottle feeding is going ok, she is starting to get it a bit. This morning she took 13 ounces by bottle and had the other 16 by tube.

Grandma (Rena's mom) holding Aimee for the first time

Aunt Denise holding Aimee for the first time

Bottle Feeding

Aimee got a bottle for the first time yesterday. She ate 9 mL before they had to tube feed her the rest. The nurse said that was good for a first try. Today, I got to try to feed her a bottle. At first, it was good. She was sucking on it, but then she just spit it all back out. She maybe got a couple of mL swallowed. It will take time, but she's getting to try which is good. Mike is going to try giving her a bottle tomorrow while we are there.

She is up to 1556 grams or 3 pounds, 6 ounces.

The nurse told us yesterday that Aimee will have to do a car seat test before she can come home. She will have to sit in her car seat for an hour with the monitors on. If her SpO2 drops below 88, she will have to go for an hour and a half. If it drops again, it's a fail and they will have to try again in 24 hours. She said it's common for preemies to fail the first time and sometimes can fail 2 or 3 times. It's due to being so small and the way they sit in a car seat.

Aimee was one month old yesterday. I can't believe it has been a month already.

Trying to give Aimee a bottle. She wanted to sleep.

Cambridge

It's been a while since I have updated this. Aimee got transferred to Cambridge on Sunday. She's doing really good. She is no longer in the NICU, just in the regular nursery.

She is up to 1497 grams or 3  pounds 4 ounces. She is eating 30 mL every 3 hours now. The nurse was saying today that she may be able to start nursing or bottle feeding soon, maybe tomorrow. 

Her onesie is a little big.

Looking at her daddy

Sleeping

She slept almost the entire time we were visiting her today and woke up as we were getting ready to leave.