Fond Farewell

Dear Friends,

Today was my first day in sunlight!  Because I woke up this morning, and check out my Goal for the Day:

Guess what, I met my goal (sorta--I'm going to hang out in Boston for a while until I head to my Main Crib). But first, I had to accomplish a few things.

Like meet my Mammom, who flew out here from San Diego to get acquainted with me and help bring me home.  I am her tenth grandchild!  She's a complete pro at being a grandmother, and pretty much a celebrity in my family.  

And I had to pass a Car Seat Test.  It turns out that the angle of car seats can make it hard for some small people like me to breathe, so we have to show that we are safe sitting in our seats for an extended period of time before we leave the NICU.  I took a nice long nap in my seat yesterday.  No big deal.  Oh, and check out my glow foot--is that awesome or what?  Definitely the coolest of my monitor probes.  

 

My nurse gave me a warm bath this morning.  After wondering initially what the heck was going on, and then thinking, hey, this kind of reminds me of a warm dark time inside...I relaxed and enjoyed the rubdown.  Of course, right after that I made a blowout diaper and my mom had to change my outfit, haha.  

Meanwhile Mom had to pack up all our stuff, watch a video on infant CPR, learn how to make my fortified bottles, and sign some paperwork.

The hardest part was I had so many loving people to say goodbye to.  I enjoyed some final snuggles with my nurses.  So many nurses came by yesterday and had long conversations with my mom.  She is going to miss all the friends she made here.  

After Mom fed me one more time, nurse Ellen came in to take off my leads to the monitor.  No more lines, no more beeping.  I was tucked into my carseat and snapped into the stroller, and we rolled out of room 1080.  We had a final goodbye at our neighbor's room--she's a preemie too, and her mom and mine made friends upstairs while they were waiting.  I'm sending all my strength and growth her way, because she's just begun her journey in the NICU, but she's going to do great.  My mom and hers cried and hugged and made the nurses cry too.  They gave each other a ton of support.  Who doesn't need that in this life?

And then we were leaving Blake 10 and the hospital and moving on.  My mom looked a little wide eyed, but I mostly just slept through the journey out and the car ride to my aunt and uncle's apartment at Harvard.  I'm ready for the next thing.  The Big Wide World and I have lots to do, and I've been working all month long to get started. 

Friends, thank you for sticking with us on this adventure, and cheering us on with your notes and gifts and kindnesses.  We'll need your love and understanding when we get home too.  I can't wait to meet all of you, but I have to hang out in Boston for a bit and then bond with my dad and sisters first.  Mom might be a little distracted from the blog because first, she's going to watch me breathe All The Time, and this week we have to check in with doctors to make sure I'm doing okay without my friends at Mass General Hospital, and then ride on the airplane, and get used to being home...  She's happy and relieved but a little tired, too.  She says six weeks feels a little like it was only a few days, but then, it's almost September and the last time you saw her it was July.  

Needless to say, we will see you SOON, buddies!  

XOXO, 

Tootsie

Wonder

Today may be one of the most lovely of days.  The air is warm but not humid; there's a breeze and a slant of light that suggests the threshold of summer and fall.  The taste of the air and the energy of Bostonians out enjoying the amazing weather reminded me that East Coasters have fervor for beautiful days, seizing the opportunity to be outside and doing it up right, spreading blankets in the grass, crowding outdoor eateries, boating, swimming, running, playing.  Smiling.

I left the air-conditioned hospital after feeding Tootsie to run some errands (how normal!), and found my face greeted by warm sun and friendly people.  I had an irresistible urge to jog or skip, and instead, celebrated my serendipitously glorious day with a soy chocolate fudge ice cream cone from J.P. Licks (the most awesome texture and flavor!  I heard a passerby tell her friend as she watched me lick my cone, "Quiero uno!").

I headed down Charles Street to the Public Gardens, where a friend of my former student who attends Berklee College of Music does a poetry exchange on the bridge--he'll write you a poem and you write one back (amid the other "buskers," including balloon men, musicians, jugglers, etc.).  Alas, he wasn't there, though I was writing poetry in my head as I walked and swooned over my soy ice cream.  I admired the swan boats, the geese, the families, the flowers, the few trees adopting fall colors, and the joy of my current life--healthy children and husband at home, beautiful growing baby here, almost ready to reunite with her family.

I picked up some photos I ordered from the drugstore near the hospital, and traveled the familiar route back to the main entrance, pausing to admire some fluffy-plump birds splashing and frolicking in a filthy puddle in the street.  They seemed to feel as I did about the day and I caught the eye of a woman headed in the other direction and we grinned at each other.

Back in the lounge kitchen adjacent to the NICU I ran into the gentleman who restocks the drinks and delivers our meals--my friend the "Reader with a Capital R."  I told him how wonderful it was outside and asked him about his day.  Did he have any time to read?  Too busy, he replied.  I have a book recommendation for you, I shared.  It's a book I bought for Big Sis, among a stack of young adult titles recommended by someone, somewhere (need to figure that out again!), which she read while she was here and insisted that my sister and her husband read as well. They in turn told me I must read it, too.  And now I want the world to pick it up and discuss.  It was a perfect read for me with a baby in the NICU.

It's called Wonder, I told my hospital friend.  "I love the title already," he responded, "Wonder is something we have as children.  Something I grew up with in Haiti.  But we lose it as adults.  Machines get between us and nature."  (I'm thinking now of one of my favorite poems, Wordsworth's "The World is Too Much with Us":  Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers/Little in nature we see that is ours).

It's a beautiful book, I told him.  It will make you happy.

Thank you, Big Sis, for the strong endorsement.  Thank you, Boston, for this afternoon.  Thank you, my body, for healing so that I want to skip and run and jump today.

My mother will be here in only a few hours.  I CANNOT WAIT for her and Tootsie to gaze at each other.  With wonder.

List: Tootsie's Gifts

After my sister traveled from the Pacific Northwest to visit me and our baby, I wrote her to say how much I loved all our conversations while she was here.  She wrote back, "Me too.  Grateful for the one-on-one time.  It's rare...a sweet gift from Tootsie."

I had the epiphany then that my sister recognized something important about this six-week experience I've had with my new daughter:  it has strengthened relationships, given me time with people who are very very important to me, given my daughters time with people who are important to us, and facilitated some chance encounters with local friends with whom I wouldn't have otherwise caught up.

A dear friend and colleague wrote me an email suggesting that our journey (as chronicled here) may have influenced others as well.  "Pound for pound," he wrote, "Tootsie is having quite an impact."

We haven't endured a tragedy; I would not characterize our baby as a "miracle" unless we all are miracles in some form; the magic is in the reaching out and creating community, which she has encouraged me to do.

Tootsie has offered other gifts as well:

1.  Boston:  I thought, before we arrived in July, that I was more familiar with Boston.  It turns out that attending the Harvard-Yale game in 1990 (I mostly remember a discotheque called "Spaghetti," the tailgate area at the stadium, and the rocket MIT pranksters launched from a field goal post during the third quarter) and running the marathon in 1996 did not afford me many memories of the city itself.  My recent time here has, though, and I've joked that the little girl who brought us to Boston is still the only family member who hasn't gotten out and about in the city yet.  Massachusetts General Hospital is conveniently located within walking distance of just about everything.  While visitors were here, we used time between every-three-hour feedings to make field trips to the Inner Harbor, North End, Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market, the Esplanade, downtown, Long Wharf, Beacon Hill, and Back Bay.  The other day I even gave directions to a tourist on the street.  I loved the city from the start, with its parks, family-friendliness, safety, incredible infrastructure, history, and warm people.  We will return here someday as a family to visit Tootsie's birthplace and all it has to offer.

2.  Empathy:  When Big Sis had surgery for kidney reflux six years ago, I wrote on this blog that one generally comes away from hospital visits feeling grateful and fortunate. This experience is no different.  Though we endured a scary time early on when Tootsie's meningitis was raging, she began showing remarkable signs of recovery and strength very soon, and continued her upward trajectory fairly consistently.  We are surrounded in the NICU by more sober stories--babies born earlier and with more complications.  I met two mothers during dinner in the lounge last night, both of whom gave birth to babies under one-and-a-half pounds at birth.  Both babies have serious lung complications and tracheotomies.  Both parents have already endured months in the NICU.  Both expressed empathy for me when I explained that we were from California.  There's no competition among difficult experiences, only empathy and understanding.  There's struggle, hardship, endurance, and hope.  We all feel it, and living with Tootsie here on the NICU has deepened my sense of empathy for all of us on our journeys, wherever we are.

3.  Patience:  While I've felt anxiety and stress and the desire to get home, I've practiced patience in new ways during the past six weeks.  My initial hospital bedrest foisted patience upon me:  there was nothing to do but wait and accept my circumstances.  And because I was no longer in control, I was able to do so.  No amount of yearning to be home with my children and husband made me want to accelerate our baby's exit from the NICU against better judgment.  She's been the captain of our ship, and I've been the patient first mate.  I feel a remarkable inner calm and lack of urgency now.  We will get home.  The next chapters of our life will unfold.  I am not pushing.

4.  My Littlest Sister:  After living on the east coast for seven years after college and teaching abroad in Kenya for a year, I made the decision to return to California and my family.  My youngest brother and sister were still in middle and high school--I'd left home when they were eight and five.  I have always been glad I made the choice to come home; I credit that decision for my close relationships with those two siblings (now my brother's wife is even my colleague!).  The plan for this trip was that the girls and I would spend time with my sister and her husband before and after a week in Maine.  Instead, my sister spent nights with me in the hospital and was by my side at Tootsie's birth, and I've shared weeks of meals and conversations with her and her husband.  I'm able to more closely admire the life they've built together, their marriage, and their generosity.  And this week I'm here for my sister as she copes with unexpected bad news.  I wouldn't have been otherwise.

5.  Letting Go of Control:  I'm a planner and organizer (though my home and desk don't suggest so) and like to have a firm sense of what's coming.  2013 has been a year of unexpected events:  pregnancy (though wished for, not counted upon), a new house, and a new job.  I must be honest and admit that I've wondered if I could manage it all.  I planned to open the school year with enthusiasm and a little trepidation.  I hoped I'd resume parenting an infant with relative ease.  But I wasn't sure.  To cope with some anxiety and insecurity, I began carefully planning, mapping out the six weeks I'd be back to work in August and September pre-baby with to-do lists and calendars.  And then Tootsie disrupted my scheme--and my worries about "the other stuff."  I wasn't at work in July and August to hire new staff, to set things up and train folks.  I'm not there now to set tone, model, and represent our high school as its leader.  Because I'm not in control, I can only worry so much.  Instead, I focus on the tasks I can actually accomplish from afar, the ways I can help, the reassurances I can give, the questions I can ask on behalf of others, and the decisions I can make.  I feel trust in the team.  I feel confidence in our community.  I know that if I were there--if this hadn't happened--I'd be running on a few more cylinders, spinning out a little, perhaps.  And maybe that spinning is why our top landed here, idle for the moment.  I suspect returning to my job later this fall will be easier with my new perspective and acceptance of the unexpected.  We will see.  But I am grateful to Tootsie for helping me let go and be right where I am.

6.  Time:  Between the waiting upstairs and the pockets of time between infant care and long snuggles now, I've had time to read books, write, and think.  No house to clean, meals to prepare, others to care for except sweet baby girl.  Time, even alone with one's thoughts, but particularly with an infant, is a luxury indeed.

7.  Bonding:  I fell in love with our baby the moment she raised her arm high in birth and made the reassuring squawks announcing her debut.  I felt I could pick her out of a lineup after a few hours.  I believe I know her and her little personality--as tenderly developed as it is thus far--intimately well.  She takes long to awaken, grunting, stretching, wagging her head back and forth, sometimes for half an hour.  She rarely cries, but when she does, it's a sweet "ewww WAH" followed by a longer "WAAAAAH."  When she starts to breastfeed, she often stops to take in the view and contemplate her surroundings and task.  She stops everything when I sing to her, save for furious chomping on her pacifier.  She is "stingy with her burps," according to the nurses, but noisy when one is on its way.  She's alert and watchful and remarkably calm.  She can raise her torso by planting her feet on her bed and pushing upward.  She's learning to put her fingers to her mouth.  She makes the "ooh" face for which her older sister was known.  We've had precious bonding time--almost as if we were relegated to a cave together.  And because I don't live in the Boston area, I've had nowhere else to be and a laser focus on nurturing Tootsie's growth here in our NICU "home."  I suspect we'll long reap the benefits of this unique time together.

8.  Gratitude:  I've always preferred giving to getting, more comfortable offering others assistance than receiving it.  But circumstances sometimes dictate being open to the love and warmth of others without guilt, obligation, or anything but deep gratitude.  The doctors, nurses, therapists, and support staff have offered us such personalized, tender care.  I have been overwhelmed by the unwavering love and generosity of my family members, willing to fly far to be with me and our daughters.  Anything I've needed has appeared, or been offered or procured without question.  Friends and colleagues have sent messages of love and encouragement and thoughtful gifts, and cared for our daughters.  I've been particularly moved by those who've shared their stories of childbearing and parenting with me, memories and anecdotes unearthed through our own storytelling.  We feel so incredibly blessed, nestled in a nurturing cradle of community.

9.  Tootsie, Herself:  She's a caboose of a kiddo, with siblings seven and ten years older than she, but I can feel already the joy she's bringing into our lives.  I look forward to discovering all the other ways she will influence and enrich us.

Thank you for the gift of your presence, sweet baby girl.

Three Weeks

Thank you for my gifts, sweet friends--I'm still a Cali Girl!

Today is a big day for our girl.  She is three weeks old--and believe it or not, time has sort of flown in that respect here in our little manse in the NICU!  Funny to think she is still not "due" yet, though, for another month.

Nurses will insert another peripheral IV for her today in preparation for her MRI.  She needs it for the contrast aspect of the procedure.  

Last night our proactive nurse began implementing a bottle/breastfeed plan which went well.  Tootsie took three bottles, breastfed once (soon I will be limited to only a few times a day so she gets all her calories), and slept through only one feed.  She sucks her bottles down in no time whatsoever, despite the slow-flow nipple; there's no doubt she has a healthy appetite.  We will keep moving her forward and hopefully away from her NG tube.  Things look promising.  

Tomorrow is Day 21 of her antibiotics, which means her PICC line will come out as soon as we're confident she won't need it (pending lab results).  And then she will have fewer lines--fewer ties binding her, shall we say, to the NICU.  

I've had some sweet visits in the past few days.  A couple whose children were my students, and who share time between Boston and the west coast, came to say hello, and it was wonderful to see familiar faces and catch up.  Yesterday a former student who attends Berklee School of Music came to the hospital to meet our baby and then we went for a long walk through the Public Gardens and down Newbury and Commonwealth Streets (what a gorgeous city this is).  I was buoyed by the excitement of my college-age friend, her exuberance for the life she's living and generosity of time with me.  

And also, we had ice cream at J.P. Licks.  White coffee chocolate chunk...yum.  

Sugar and Spice

My sister from Oregon is here, and brought bows and flowers and outfits to dress up our little girl:

There's no denying she's cute.

She was also present to see Tootsie top the scales at 5lbs. 1oz. last night!

My sister has experienced a range of medical issues and challenges with her three sons, including a NICU stay with her eldest, and motility issues with both her first and second sons (which I've written about here).  Right now there's a kinship between our cousin on a feeding tube and our own baby with her NG tube, too.  We've bonded as I listen to my sister recall her own NICU saga and provide updates on the status of my nephews' health.  My sisters--one a nurse, the other with so much experience in the hospital--have been ideal companions through this journey.  

We're trying to figure out how much breastmilk Tootsie is getting during a feeding, so at some point during the day we weigh her before and after a feed.  It's an inexact measurement because she has lines dangling, but last night it looked like she took 26 milliliters.  The nurse subtracted that much milk (the most we've ever measured) from her fortified tube feed.  Well, about an hour later, she started squawking.  She was still hungry.  She is interacting more and more with regard to her feeding, which is a great sign.  We'll expect her to be more in charge of when she feeds when she goes home.  The current plan, to help support her growth and weight gain, is for us to feed her by (supplemented) bottle of breastmilk most times, and feed by breast alone three times a day or so.  As she shows continual weight gain, we'll add more breastfeeding.  

My sister and I wandered to Boston's North End for dinner last night, the Italian section of town.  It was hopping on a Saturday night, with a feast celebration running down several blocks and lines for every restaurant.  We were fortunate to secure a table quickly in a great trattoria and had a lovely dinner. We returned to find our night nurse is a North End resident.  

My sister leaves today, and my Cambridge sister returns tomorrow.  I'm hoping my next family visitor is my mother, who will come help us transition out of the NICU, onto an airplane, and home to our family.  Wednesday is Day 21 of the antibiotics regimen, so we're hopeful we will know more then...

TGIF: 35 Weeks and 4lbs. 14oz

Tootsie news yesterday by statistics:  It's Friday, so she's 35 weeks.  And she is on the ounce-a-day gain train, now only two ounces shy of a nice round five pounds!  She passed her hearing test (which I anticipated, because she reacts so strongly when I sing to her.  Ahem.  No comments, please) and I got to wash her hair.

Her biggest obstacle to surmount before she is sprung from the NICU is taking all her feedings by mouth.  She needs to be alert at each three-hour feeding first, and she still sleeps through several a day (which means they hook up her milk by tube).

I've found myself having to avoid reading too much news, as there is too much depressing coverage, with crashing planes, kidnappings, protesters dead, babies abandoned.  As a friend wrote on Facebook, "I wish I could unread that Hannah Anderson article..."

We are also at a place in the NICU where Tootsie is stable and basically what they call a "Feeder/Grower."  Yet we are surrounded by very sick babies, and I pass by their rooms with hope and reverence, mindful of where their parents are on their journeys with their newborns.

My family--determined to have someone here to support me at all times--provides uplift and distractions and opportunities for fresh air.  And the internet comes through with some sources of inspiration.

Here's a video about a teacher, dad, and human being determined to enrich others' lives:

And here's a mother panda reunited with her baby (I can so relate to this one!)

Note, however:  syrup or honey or whatever they used to distract Mom while they sneaked her baby away wouldn't work on me...but the promise of sleep, maybe, would...

Lack of Organizational Skills

Premature babies are often referred to as "disorganized" by nurses, doctors, occupational and physical therapists, lactation consultants, and their own parents when they're eight years old and up (I can just see the excuse from Tootsie now:  "But Mom, I've been disorganized since birth!  I was born this way!").

What the professionals are referring to is the babies' tendency to flail arms and legs around, crane neck from side to side, and generally exhibit entropy from their core.  Unlike full-term babies, they don't have the motor skills and neuro pathways developed enough to keep things centered and calm.  If you watch Tootsie, she's still trying to figure out her hands as they're related to her mouth (and her arms!).

It all makes sense if you consider that at almost 35 weeks gestation, our baby girl should still be in the womb for a month more, curled in a ball, organized.  Almost everything they do here in the NICU is meant to replicate that experience (lots of sleep, quiet, swaddling) so that her brain and body can continue to develop, as was her only job inside of me.  Now, though, she is charged with learning to eat from the breast and bottle, too, and fatten herself up so she can regulate her own temperature outside the consistently warm environment in utero.  It's quite a transition, and she has a lot of work to do that would normally be accomplished by amniotic fluid and the umbilical cord.

Since she can't only focus on the skills that will bring her home--feeding and fattening--and since brain development is so crucial too, her Care Team restricts the number of time she breastfeeds (and bottle feeds) for now, ensuring that she not only gets enough extra calories through her tube feeds, but that she also has plenty of opportunities to sleep.  The process of getting her home is slow and steady, and the discharge date on her board still reads "TBD" as I suspect it will for some time.

Yesterday's leap was, after recording weight gain to 4lbs. 12 oz., lifting the pop top of her isolette and having her sleep in room-temperature air.  Last night's nurse bundled her up and watched her temp closely, and so far so good.  She may even graduate to a big-girl crib soon!

In the meantime, we're keeping her organized:  Legs tucked, arms and elbows oriented to her midline.

It will be interesting to see what her backpack looks like in middle school...

Organized baby:  swaddled, tucked in, binky deployed, and doll from the USVI providing support

What We See Is What We Have: Near Perfection

Let's begin with a goofy picture of Punk Rock Baby Tootsie.

Her hair and the shadows of the blanket beneath her head conspire to make it appear she has quite the mohawk.  In fact, she has a surprising amount of corn-silky-soft black hair in a pixie 'do.

Baby had a great night last night.  She had only one apneic episode; she tolerated her feeds well and appears ready for an increase in volume; she began sucking on a binky.

When swaddled and snuggled in for the night, she was so calm and expressive with her eyes (so very cute, our nurse told us), that the nurse beckoned others to come admire her, too.  We're totally biased, of course, but Tootsie is clearly building a dedicated fan club.

Last night's nurse let us know that she was requesting to be part of Tootsie's Team.  I'd forgotten that my sister (and mother of a preemie cousin who is now a healthy five years old) shared that our baby would have a core care team of nurses.  Because we know that she will be in the hospital for at least 21 days to run her courses of antibiotics, they're beginning to assemble Tootsie's Team.  She's taking letters of interest and applications and clearly showing off to win over the pool of qualified potential draftees.  Tootsie's Team and her room will be our home away from home, and we will all become familiar with one another as we collaborate on her care and the nurses train us to take over delicate aspects of protecting a preemie baby.

We were present for a consult and examination by the Occupational Therapist.  She checked reflexes and observed her movements and alertness.  We all noted her rooting behavior, one of the signs she is preparing herself to suckle a bottle or breast.  Her rooting and sucking makes her eligible for daily scoring on a feeding readiness scale, and we will get to present her with an empty breast soon for her to practice licking and tasting.  I'm very excited about this step and motivated to breastfeed, not only for the health and convenience benefits, but because it's a most awesome bonding experience for mother and baby.  I've cherished it each time, and am more determined than ever to breastfeed our last little one.  I'm pumping every three hours around the clock to stimulate my production and generate milk for her feeds.

This afternoon was our Family Meeting.  When I told my brother in the USVI that we had a Family Meeting planned for later in the week, he responded, "Hmmm.  So you and Husband and Tootsie will get together and talk things out...?"  Haha.

The Family Meeting comprised Husband and I, two of her nurses, the social worker, a hospital administrator, a neonatology intern and the neonatology fellow, who ran the meeting.

We expected to discuss growth and development goals, thresholds for stepping down to the Special Care Nursery, and plans for family accommodations after my discharge from the hospital tomorrow.

But the meeting began on a very serious note, with a review of the events around her infection and its severity, and how The Team would continue to address potential ramifications.

Honestly, once we'd gotten through Wednesday and marked two clear blood cultures and Tootsie's promising recovery, The Infection moved to a more distant and less significant part of my hard drive.  But the doctor dragged it right back onto the desktop, reviewing mortality rates and statistics related to defects and brain damage.  Tootsie would have another spinal tap, soon, the doctor reminded us, to rule out lingering bacteria in the meninges and fluid.  And close to the end of her 21-day courses of antibiotics, Tootsie will have an MRI so we could see effects on the brain of the infection, if any.  Statistics are around 50% likeliness that she will have some neurological effects (developmental delays, cerebral palsy, seizure disorder, among other possibilities). While we're fortunate that infection was expected and antibiotics started right away, she still grew cultures from her first lumbar puncture, and we don't know how long she was suffering from infection in utero.

We moved on to discuss her recent notable developments, alertness, and activity levels, and goals for her feeding.  Much more fun topics!  We closed the meeting by talking about my discharge and options for sleeping on the couch in Tootsie's room, temporarily occupying a family dorm room in the hospital, and making use of hospital-provided taxi vouchers to shuttle me to and from my sister's apartment while I am still healing from the c-section.  We toured the dorm rooms (not unlike the closet-bedrooms I slept in in college), and they showed us the microwave and fridge and stash of saltines and peanut butter and jelly packets for parental snacking under duress.

And then we went back to see Toots, who was bright-eyed and adorable as usual, enduring a diaper change and looking, really, quite normal.

It turns out it's hard to look into those eyes and worry.  She's a pretty reassuring bug.

In the conference room, the specter of having a child with neurological challenges felt scary, disappointing, mysterious.  But with our baby in front of us, progressing as a child her gestational age would and should, the fear is unsteady on its feet.  If this little girl, with a tight grip on our fingers and eyes that respond to our voices, has developmental problems, we will certainly learn about them and grow up with them together.  Right now, she's exactly what we signed up for--a baby (and she has already far exceeded our expectations).  No diagnosis or knowledge revealed by testing will change how she presents to us at this moment, and what we see:  a nearly perfect baby human (and a darned cute one at that!).  Of course, not all is as it initially seems sometimes--a mohawk might just be a halo, or a crown, or an illusion.  But the magic of parenting is how your children are immediately yours, no matter what.  Oh how I feel that today.

We're bound to find out lots of things along her way--quite possibly that she's disorganized, impulsive, maybe weepy under duress like her mother, or a little grumpy like her dad.  She may have a thing for numbers and not for spelling.  She could have two left feet.  She might sing off key.  Nevertheless, hers is exactly the model we've fallen in love with and are taking home, and we accept all her features and those which will reveal themselves to us as she gradually reveals herself to the world.

It's such an exciting prospect, that we're only on day four of this unfolding saga, the discovery of our new family member.  It's worthy of a daily celebration.

Cheers!

Little Baby, Big Day

Yesterday afternoon, my sister-in-law sent a video of Little Sis taking a horseback riding lesson at a race horse sanctuary on St. Thomas.  As Little Sis and her horse walked laps in the paddock, I could hear the gent giving her the lesson reminding her to "Breathe!  Breathe!"  Because you know, of all the fundamentals required for horseback riding, breathing is pretty much...essential.

I used deep breathing--counting deep breaths--as a strategy for getting through painful contractions last week.

And it's hard not to admonish from the sidelines, "C'mon, Tootsie!  Breathe!" when she "forgets" during an apneic episode.

We've been all alternately holding breaths and panting.  When we are deep in intense or stressful moments, we paralyze our breathing without recognizing we are doing so.  That's why we hear so often as part of singing, dancing, playing musical instruments, swimming, lifting, concentrating. stretching, meditating, enduring transitions, preparing for pain:

Don't forget to breathe.  Take slow, deep breaths.  Inhale through the nose; exhale through the mouth.

Because deep breaths are calming.  And I have extra time for them right now.  Baby is practicing regular breathing.  It's a habit she will have to show she has mastered before we go home.

Yesterday morning my goal was to take a shower and wash my hair, the same goal I had on Tootsie's birthday.  It was the first, but it won't be the last time she foils my plans for basic hygiene.  Yesterday, though, I triumphantly showered and shampooed.  I applied deodorant and lotion and I put Real Clothes on.  I felt like a million bucks as I scoffed at the wheelchair and told the nurses I would walk to the NICU.

We'd already heard the first good news of the day from the NICU:  Tootsie's blood culture came back negative, a sign she was defeating her infection (she needs at least two more negative cultures to confirm a fully treated infection).

We arrived to find her a reassuring rosy-pink color and wiggly:  stretching, grimacing, kicking, raising her arms overhead.

The nurse declared her ready for her first feed:  5 cc of breastmilk via her tube.  I got to administer my magic milk, gently pulsing a syringe over five minutes.  I also swabbed her mouth and lips with a breastmilk-soaked q-tip.

She'd been too weak to feed only yesterday, but today was looking auspicious already.

Casual leg=vacation mode

The nurse told us this would be the first in a cycle of three-hour feedings, with the next one at 2 PM.

We went back to the room for lunch, a nap, and a surprise visit from the sister of a dear friend of ours.  She brought chocolate, a hand-crocheted hat for Toots, and a book set in Maine (since I missed my time there).

Husband returned to the NICU for her next feeding, and got to change a diaper too.  He reported that they'd begun swaddling to help calm her and maintain her regular breathing patterns.

I went down for her 5 o'clock feeding with one of our dedicated nurses in tow who was determined to catch a glimpse of our girl.  Evelyn was there for the next round of good news:  the umbilical line monitoring her blood pressure wasn't working, and because they knew her pressure was stable, they took it out.

That was the line that precluded us from holding her.  And I would get to hold her, for the first time, if I wanted.  I resisted jumping up and down and clapping.

I settled into a comfy recliner, pulled my top down, and snuggled my baby right up on my chest, skin to skin.  It was her first time lying on her tummy, and she looked and felt content.  My whole body, heart, and soul absorbed her in that two-hour snuggle worth waiting for.  I put the Patty Griffin Pandora station on so I could sing to her.  We dozed.  Then I FaceTimed with my mom and the girls so they could see her and me, together.

Biology and bonding did its work.  Soon I felt the twinges of my uterus contracting down and my breasts leaking milk, even though she hadn't even suckled.  Pumping was working to stimulate my production, but being around my baby brought my milk in.

My view of our little nugget:

Finally it was time to return her to her giraffe.  We started with a diaper change.  Tootsie had missed her 5 o'clock feeding because it appeared she hadn't fully digested her last round of milk.  She'd have to digest and poop, probably, to be ready for more.

But inside her nappy was the next surprise.  The nurse caught a glimpse of dark meconium and declared herself in love with our baby.  Tootsie artfully dodged a suppository with that brilliant maneuver.  Apparently she's Harvard material in bowel movements, too.

We changed her diaper, and our nurse swaddled her and propped her on her side.  Baby popped her eyes open for a prolonged period of quiet watchfulness, comforted by her warm cocoon, anticipating her next round of breast milk.  It was hard for me to leave, with her eyes locked with mine and responding to my voice.  These are the mystical moments when one believes an infant to be an old soul.  It doesn't matter if she's not; staring into each other's eyes becomes part of her development of emotional intelligence, of understanding what it is to be human.  Of becoming responsive and connected and attached.

Soon, though, her eyelids were drooping, and I was feeling hungry.  The nurse sent me back to my room with a few Tootsie-scent-drenched blankets to snuggle in my sleep tonight.

What a beautiful day.  We acknowledge that this journey is potentially rife with twists and turns, but yesterday was about strength and health and connections--all pluses to carry into today, another bright day, I'm betting.  At 2PM we'll have a "Family Meeting," in which the nurses, doctors, and social worker will meet with us in one big huddle to answer questions and chart a tentative course for the future.

Sleep well, friends!  Breathe.