Going on a week!!!

Dads turn! A somewhat quiet day...but only because the nurses said so :) As Im thinking about what to tell you, Im realizing that some of the things that happend today were really quite scary, and if they happened on day one....someone would have gotten hurt. Melanie has kind of been struggling with her CPAP. My goal tomorrow is to get a few pictures of these machines and monitors to help explain what Im talking about. Nothing terrible, but, I guess I'd call them annoying little problems. We explained what a Brady is a while back, but I got a little better description from a mom and a nurse tonite. So, while its fresh, I'll try to explain whats happening. Many times, when Melanie has a Brady, she gets over them herself. She may forget to breath, or when the nurse is sucking the mucus out of her, she gets flustered, and her heart may go from 150 beats per minute down to 40 or so. These havent lasted long, but I HATE (maybe a better group of words to describe my emotion would be that I would rather pull off my own toe nails with a pliers than) to see them. If she doesnt come out of them in a few seconds, the nurses will shake her and poke at her a little bit to get her moving so she can get over it. She had probably 30 or so of those today is my guess. My opinion....when a heart stops or is failing...something is not good. But, I guess when you get involved in the neonatal unit, it becomes something like pitching manure out of a barn when you have pigs in it...its just something that has to happen...so they tell me.

Anyway, when feeding today, they drew out her stomach to see how much she digested, and they found blood. This also may have had something to do with her Bradys. I was told a few posibilites of why this may be happening. #1, she is getting a lot of air in her stomach from the CPAP. This might be causing stomach reflux or something. #2, she might have some sort of infection in her stomach. #3, THEY ARENT SURE! Lets hope its #1 or #2. Westra's usually get excited about setting records or coming up with something new, but in the NICU, Im not at all about inventing something. Anyway, what this is also leading to is a very bloated little girl. Just to give you an idea, they have been feeding Melanie 2 mls of milk every three hours. When they draw it back out to see how much she has been digesting, the last time they drew out 20 mls of air....I wish I could communicate to her right now....Id tell her that burping and farting are totally normal and that she didnt need to be polite...matter of fact, Nicki has successfully taught her older sisters that this is something to get excited, and potentially brag about :) (may have tweaked the truth there, but you get the idea) But, this is something premies dont do either. So, they are now sucking air out of her stomach every hour. Once they started doing this, the number of Bradys have slowed down tremendously which makes the nurses think it was hurting her to take good breaths. Matter of fact, while I was there from 8:15 to 10:45, she didnt have one...however, at 10:46 when I let go of her hand, she did...I attribute this to trying to win over her dads heart so she will be completely spoiled when she comes out of this (p.s. IT WORKED! :)

Anyway, I hope that is sufficient for an update. Im posting this almost immediately after Nicki did a post, so see what my lovely tough bride had to say there...which leads me to one more thing. I dont know if Ive mentioned it, but she had a C section (dont know if thats how they spell it or not). If any of you havent seen one of these, I dont know what to tell you other than, the fact that my wife is walking, talking, and laughing I believe is a miracle. If it was me on that table, I'm pretty sure I would still be in recovery. So to all you husbands whose wife had one of these, tell them how amazing they are again...just in case you havent in a while...Im pretty sure Im wounded mentally for life on that deal.

I leave you with this: Before you go to bed tonite, or when you wake up and you are reading this, think of the shear amazement of the creation of YOU. Whether you were a 12 pound baby, all the way down to maybe less than our little peanut is (870 grams tonite, not sure what that is in pounds...I think less than 2), God created us after His own image. And the fact that we can think, speak, pray, praise, play, associate, love, touch, feel, laugh, cry, and sing is totally amazing. What a great and glorious God we serve.
"I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well" Psalm 139:14