Chloe came home on Friday at 34 weeks, 6 days gestational age. We can't believe how well she's doing! In fact, I was completely speechless on Tuesday when the doctor said she would be ready to come home on Thursday. She ended up staying one extra night because of a slight drop in heart rate on Wednesday night but got the all clear for a Friday departure. At discharge, she weighed in at 4 pounds 13.6 ounces and measured 17.72 inches long.
So she's home. Both exciting and terrifying! Mostly my concern is with feeding her because her suck swallow breathe combination is not very coordinated yet. This means a lot of breath holding, a lot of gasping, some really long pauses in breathing which occasionally need reminding to resume, and a bit of choking.... Kind of stressful. She's nursing well with a nipple shield to help her latch on, but not strong enough to nurse exclusively. She eats every 3 hours (whether she's giving cues or not, which means we set an alarm clock at night to wake up and feed her at 11, 2am, and 5am.). We've settled into a pattern of nursing her every other feeding during the day, followed by a bottle of breastmilk, followed by pumping. This becomes something of a process when done every three hours, which is why I don't nurse her at night. She's also getting a high calorie formula twice a day to help her gain weight.
Our first night was pretty rough, but the next two were better. Part of the roughness is that Chloe is sleeping in a bassinet next to our bed. And she's a very noisy sleeper just like Cassidy was. The girl grunts and groans. All. Night. Long. Combine this with me being a light sleeper with mama radar fully engaged, and I get about 2 hours of sleep in 15 minute increments. Over the past two nights I've devised a sleeping position involving a pillow strategically folded around my head to block out all but the real crying. Last night there was a good stretch of about an hour when Chloe was really quiet with hardly a wimper ...I got up to check on her breathing three times.
Cassidy is a fantastic big sister and very helpful. She soothes Chloe during diaper changes, throws diapers in the diaper genie for me, fetches things from Chloe's room, and holds her. She's doing as well on patience as can be expected from a five year old. Actually, that's not true... She's wonderful. Better than I expected!
Our first pediatrician appointment is tomorrow when hopefully we will get the go ahead to drop out some of the supplemental bottles and move to more exclusive nursing.
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