This morning when we saw her, her breathing machine was helping her to take about 20 breaths a minute. This evening the machine was adjusted down to 17 breaths a minute. Go, Alicia, Go! Problem is sometimes our little one gets a little to comfortable and forgets to breath. Setting off the beeps of the monitors alerting the nurses that there is a problem. But it's all right, all the nurses need to do is kind of pat her gently and she'll wake up and remember to breathe again.
While we were there, Linda and I were singing to her, and I guess she must have fallen asleep to our singing cause suddenly the machines started beeping, but the doctor and nurse came over and took care of it, and she was fine.
A little bit of clarification on the heart and the heart medicine. Apparently, if I didn't misunderstand the nurse this evening, each child gets up to two rounds of medicine that is intended to close the hole in the heart. Each round consists of three shots. Today, Alicia got her third shot finishing off her first round of injections. Pray with us for a miracle, that tomorrow morning when the doctors check Alicia's heart, they will find a beautifully crafted, whole and complete heart.
We shared earlier that we've been able to get a bit of milk out of Linda. God is amazing. We were told by a doula friend of ours that Linda's milk is different than the milk that moms of full-term babies have. Linda's milk is especially formulated for a preemie. Seriously, God thinks of everything. Since this was only the second day after labor, we weren't able to get a whole lot of milk from Linda. But when we talked to the nurse during our evening visit we were happy to hear that even the little bit that we were able to squeeze out, is making a difference. Every day, they give Alicia a "lollipop" to help her practice sucking. The lollipop is the cotton-swab thing that you see sticking out of Alicia's mouth in some pictures. Today after we delivered Linda's milk, they were able to dip the swab into the milk and let Alicia suck on it to get some of the nutrients and antibodies that she so needs.
Linda continues to do better and better. Please pray for us to have some good nurses. We're really learning that a good bedside manner makes a huge difference. We had a grumpy nurse today, and she was just a bit unpleasant. Unfortunately this nurse was tasked with the charge of removing Linda's last IV, which is a praise, but also to draw some blood for a blood test. I say unfortunately cause not only was she miss sourpuss, but she also missed twice when she was trying to get Linda's blood. In the end, she had to ask another nurse to come in to draw the blood. Sigh. Poor Linda. She's been so strong through all of this poking and prodding, but today after the nurse missed twice, she just broke down in tears. There's only so much poking and prodding a person can take. When the second nurse came in, I just wanted to smack her. She saw Linda crying and she was like, "Are you afraid of pain?" I so wanted to say, "How would you feel if you've had 20 needles in and out of your body over the last three days, you stupid woman!" But I controlled myself. I'm sorry. I don't want to be mean. But sometimes these people really annoy me. Perhaps I'm just getting tired.
Well, I should go get some rest. Tomorrow is another day. By the way it's almost 72 hours. And things seem to be all right. No news is good news at this point. I think the first 2 weeks are the most critical. But as the doctors told us today, we just take it one day at a time. Each day that passes without incident is another day closer to victory.
Alicia, you best out live Mommy and Daddy! =)
Oh man. I feel for Linda. I remember counting during my hospital stay in Mackay. It took a total of 21 needle sticks to do what should have been done in 7; so many missed attempts. And I hear you that a good bedside manner makes all the difference! Hopefully she's done with sticks now but if not, I wonder if asking for a butterfly needle would help; that was one of the first things I learned how to say, "Qing ni yong hu die zhen." (And some of them would ignore me.) Anyhow, thank you for another update and filling us in more. And I'm glad you've solved the mystery of what the stick in her mouth in some of the pics is! :)
ReplyDeleteI think nurses in Taiwan need some sensitivity training!
ReplyDeleteEnjoying reading your posts when Caleb gives me a chance, and praying for you. Soon you'll be chasing after your little one too!