Keeping Up With Lily

Lily's progress the past few days has been so great it's hard to keep up with her sometimes.  The other day she wanted so much to speak out for Barack Obama for president, that I didn't get a chance to mention the recent improvements in her feedings and the temperature inside her isolette.

First, let's talk about her isolette.  When Lily first came to the NICU, they were keeping her glass house (really it's lucite, but let's not nit pick) around 34 degrees celsius, regulating her body temperature to around 37 celsius.  As she grows and is able to keep herself warm, the isolette temp is gradually dropped to compensate.  After her first week or so the isolette was down to 30.5 where it stayed for about five days.  The past few days, however, they have been steadily lowering the isolette temp, and today it is at 28.0 celsius.  This is pretty significant, as 28 is about the same as the room temp outside the isolette, a sign that she may be moved to a crib any day now.  As Lily was breathing on her own since being born, being able to regulate her own temperature was one of her next big steps, and she seems to be well on her way.

Lily's isolette, 10/11/2008  34.6 degrees

Lily's isolette today, 10/28/08   28.0 degrees

Another sign of her being ready for the real world will be to take her feedings from a bottle rather than feeding tube.  It isn't until around 34 weeks or so that babies are able to mouth feed.  They have to learn to suckle, swallow and breathe at the same time, and rest when they need to.  Also, at her age and size,  just trying to do all that can burn a lot of calories (if only we could burn calories just trying to eat).  The other day at one of her scheduled feeding times, she was awake and alert, so we decided to try to give her a bottle.  With nurse Missy's assistance and guidance, I held her, and as soon as I put the bottle in her mouth, she started going at it like a pro.  She even stopped after a short time to give herself a rest, but took every last drop from the bottle.  Since then she has taken from the bottle about every other feeding during the day.  At night when we're not at the hospital they usually feed her through her tube so she can stay rested for us to give her the bottle the next day.

Daddy feeding Lily for the first time  10/26/08

Mommy feeding Lily   10/28/08

I know this is not the last time I won't be able to keep up with my little one, I just didn't expect the first time to come so soon.  I guess I better start getting in shape.

Don't Forget To Breathe.