The Littlest Warrior: 3-Week Report

Lucy is 3 weeks old today and chugging right along! She's up to 35 mls and they are increasing her feeds by 5 mls every 12 hours. At this rate she'll be up to the target 60 mls in THREE DAYS!!! She has been keeping her food down and pooping with the help of suppositories. I think the doctors and nurses are a little surprised that we haven't encountered any major setbacks, especially with regard to the feeding, because it usually doesn't go this smoothly. Lucy is earning a reputation for herself as a sweet, cute little girl who's tough as nails. We are SO proud of her!

The surgeon is also happy with how the hole is healing. They are back to changing the dressing every day now that the hole is getting smaller. It started off being a few inches in diameter and now it's down to about an inch. It's pretty amazing! The surgeon also said that the hole is not what's keeping her in the NICU - it's just the feedings. The hole doesn't need to be completely closed before we take her home, and we may even do the final dressing changes at home ourselves. The only bummer is that her skin is getting irritated under the sticky part of the dressing. It looks like she's inherited my sensitive, reactive skin. So she has been a little grumpy after the past few dressing changes, probably because it stings her skin each time they take it off.

Lucy is having no trouble regulating her body temperature so they moved her out of the isolette and into a big girl bed! She is the only baby with a crib, and she has the primo spot in the back corner. So she's pretty much Queen Bee of the NICU now.

Lucy's new bed

We also spent a wonderful couple of days with Auntie Kate and Uncle Lee, who cruised up to San Francisco after their honeymoon! They took some beautiful pictures of everyone's favorite new model. Enjoy!