Sunday, December 10, 2006

Monkey Update

Our little one continues to do very well. He is having his first room air trial today and like all his others, I am hoping for the best but will not be shocked if he has to go back to his low flow cannula.

The fact that he is even on a low flow cannula at this point is shocking to me. He was only 8 days old when he made the switch. Margaret took 9 weeks before she could go to the cannula!!

I'm also impressed that little boy has had no a/bs to speak of. The nurse last night said that he hasn't really hit that point in his stay, yet... that William is still thriving off maternal blood. The truth is, I don't really remember before Margaret's apnea period. I just remember her having 20+ a shift and it really scared me. I suppose I should go look up when she starting all her a/bs. But I am really hoping that baby boy (and Mommy) gets to avoid most of that.

Will has also started to gain weight consistently. He was born at 3 pounds, 7.7 ounces but lost down to 3 pounds. He is now up to 3 pounds 4 ounces. Only a few more days until he'll be back at his birth weight if he continues to gain like he is.

We got the results of his cranial ultrasound yesterday and found out he has a grade 1 bilateral IVH. Although this is not bad news, I was certainly dissappointed. I was praying for the "normal" result.

The only thing that has be slightly concerned lately is William's reaction to the human milk fortifier the docs are adding to the breastmilk to up the calories. They tried to take him to 24 calories but he ended up with bad residuals so they backed him down to 22. He is still having some residual but it is within their limits. The reason I'm concerned at all is that M was so sensitive to cow's milk proteins. I am worried that W is also sensitive. I went ahead and cut out dairy when he was born but now he is getting it in the HMF. If he continues to have residuals on the HMF (he had none ever with straight bm), I am thinking of asking to the docs to either not fortify or to use something else. I know we want him to fatten up but I am worried about his digestive health and his comfort. Any advice from other preemie Moms out there?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

When BG started feeds they didn't begin to fortify until she was at full feeds. I asked no HMF and the options I was left with were feeding hind milk or microlipids. I chose to try the hind milk and it worked pretty well. She gained. It only lasted a week or so though because her ostomy prolapsed and she went back to NPO. By the time she was back up to full feeds she was past the 35w limit I set for HMF use so she went to that.

I don't really know anything about the digestibility of micro lipids since she didn't use that option. Using the hind milk can make GERD appear more severe since the imbalance of fore/hindmilk can mimic reflux symptoms. Probably doesn't help much. Every option has it's drawbacks :(

So happy to hear he's doing a trial off the cannula already! Even if he doesn't stay off it is a huge deal! And you know what? I don't remember a time that BG didn't have A's&B's either! Strange.