I got up earlier than usual to make it to the hospital for the 8:30 meal. Tera's pediatrician usually comes by around that time, and I wanted to hear what she said about Tera getting into a crib. When I arrived, Tera had a new nurse, but I knew immediately that we would hit it off. She's got a two-year-old son - just a week younger than Canon - and two daughters (so she was able to warn me about what is to come). She has also worked with Tera's pediatrician for a very long time and shares her philosophy of taking things slow.
Tera still did not gain weight last night, but she hasn't lost any either. Still exactly at 2690 grams, 5 pounds 14 ounces. I also learned that Tera's blood labs came back improved from last week. Her hematocrit is up to 29, which means she is doing a better job of making her own blood. She's still a little anemic, but she's improving.
One thing that has not improved is her ability to hold her own temperature. I don't think I've talked about this too much in the past, but this is a necessary thing if she's going to survive outside of The Box. On her Isolette, there are three numbers that we look at. One number is her actual temperature, measured by a silver probe stuck to her stomach over her liver. A second number sets the limit for her body temperature. If her temperature drops lower than that set number, an alarm on her bed goes off to alert the nurses that she is too cold. The third number tells us if she is holding her temperature. It is called the Air Temperature. This number tells how high the air temperature has to be in order for Tera to keep her set body temperature. If this number is below 30 degrees, it means that Tera is holding her own temperature with no additional help from the Isolette. Though this number has been 29-30 in the past, it's been rising over the last week. Today, it stayed between 32 and 33. In other words, Tera isn't maintaining her own temperature.
When the doctors rounded, they talked about this. The Neonatologist recommended that I keep the thermostat in the room set fairly high. He said he was setting it to 75 degrees, but it rose to 77 by the end of the morning. He wanted to go ahead and try to wean Tera into a crib, even though her Air Temp was a little high. There was still a possibility that her probe was reading incorrectly and causing it to be higher than it needed to be. Also, I'm just reporting that he predicted me might be going home by the end of the week. Only a report; I'm not setting my hopes on it.
Weaning is a slow process. First, we would wait a few hours to see if the Air Temp would come down to below 30 like the doctors want. Then, we would dress Tera in multiple layers and swaddle her in the Isolette to see how she holds her temperature. If we are lucky, she would be in a crib by the morning. By Tera's 11:30 bottle, the nurse and I knew that this would not be happening today.
I mentioned earlier that this nurse shares the pediatrician's conservative philosophy on preemies. When Tera fell right to sleep after both her 8:30 and her 11:30 bottles, and stayed asleep between both feeds, the nurse suggested that she was exhausted from transitioning to all bottle feeding. Though she hasn't had her feeding tube since Wednesday, she just started taking full bottles yesterday, so it's easy to see why she's so worn out. Usually she wakes up when we change her diaper and for a few minutes after she eats. But today, Tera barely opened her eyes even to eat, and her Air Temp was still 32-33. The nurse explained that Tera is using all of her extra energy to suck on her bottle (which she is doing very well), so she doesn't have any left to keep herself warm. She's just not ready to come out of the Isolette.
Instead, we made today a Day of Rest. And rest she did.
I was completely unselfish and wouldn't even hold her when she finished her bottles. I put her immediately back into her bed so that she wouldn't expend too many calories trying to stay warm and so that she could stretch out and rest more comfortably.
Her pediatrician came back later in the afternoon to check her Air Temperature. It was still too high, and the nurse and I told her what we had discussed about her just not being ready. She agreed, but both said that I needed to voice this opinion to the Neonatologist. If he knows that I want to move slow, he should be on board. I heard the pediatrician tell him that we would not be weaning her today, but I have a feeling I'm going to have to speak up when they come back around tomorrow. Even if her Air Temp comes down to where it should be tonight, I want to wait at least another day. I can see now how challenging this whole Crib thing is going to be on her, and I don't think she needs that challenge this soon after taking to the bottle. She truly can only do one thing at a time. There's a time to push, and there's a time to withdraw. Pushing now - when we're so close to the end - would just seem like setting her up to fail. I'd much rather help her prepare herself to succeed.
I stayed at the hospital from 8:30 this morning to 6:00 this evening. I needed to be outside, so I went for a run. When I run outside, I set the stopwatch on my phone for ten minutes. When it goes off, I turn around and run back for ten minutes. Towards the end of the first half of my run today, I passed a guy about my age running in the opposite direction. I knew that my timer was about to sound and sure enough, the alarm went off seconds later. I turned to run in the other direction, just knowing that everyone around me thought I was turning to chase this guy down. I did it anyway - I didn't know how much farther I could go in that direction. I was about twenty yards behind him when I initially turned around. It only took me a few more seconds to realize that . . . I knew this guy. It was Mills (for our Dothan friends, it was "my friend, Jon") - ne of Barry's best childhood friends, and still so today. I did exactly what I worried everyone thought I was going to do - I chased him down. I tried to keep up with him (or he slowed down for me) for a little more than a half mile before he turned to head back from where he came. Then I was able to slow down significantly for the remaining half mile. I needed the extra surge after my boring day at the hospital.
What About Barry and Canon?
My boys are still keeping the house warm. It's a good thing - the Neonatologist told me today that we would be saving lots of money on power this summer because we need to keep the thermostat set high so that Tera doesn't get too cold. I talked to Canon on FaceTime before he went to bed, and Barry showed him to me again after he had fallen asleep. I hope he is as easy to put to bed as Barry makes it out to be. I can't wait to do it myself!
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