One exciting thing is that both girls are now over 4 lbs! Saturday (March 23) was pretty cool because both girls were exactly (within half an ounce) twice their birth weight. The pace of their weight gain has really been picking up. I'll post the weights and heights at the bottom of this post.
Both girls had another eye exam about 6 days ago, and while their retinas are still immature, which is expected, there are no signs of retinopathy of prematurity. Andrea and I feel like our girls really dodged a bullet in the eye category. Now we have to hope that they get their mommy's good vision and not their daddy's eyeglass-assisted vision. I'm sure all parents do this, but we constantly talk about how our girls need to have all of our good traits and none of our bad ones. So the girls need mommy's eyes, daddy's lungs, mommy's full head of hair (I swear I'm not going bald, I've always had my receding hairline, haha), daddy's immune system, etc.
Let's talk about Paige.
She's generally been doing well, but is definitely our feisty one. She gets mad whenever anyone is doing any kind of care with her. She was making very quick progress for about two weeks, but this past week it seems like she has hit a plateau. Her oxygen requirements have increased a little bit to around 160 mL per minute (up from 100 last post), but at least she is still on low flow. Her feedings have been increased to 34 mL every 3 hours (up from 29).
Paige really likes sucking on her pacifier, but she gets so into it that she'll forget to breathe sometimes. That will cause all kinds of alarms in our room to go off, at which point we remove the pacifier from her mouth and she resumes breathing. We've tried bottle feeding her a few times, but she usually ends up choking on the milk. Her best so far has been taking 5 mL from a bottle. Seems like the suck-swallow-breathe process is still a little confusing to her. She'll eventually pick it up. The girls weren't even due until April 22, so she is attempting stuff that babies aren't supposed to be doing at her age.
Overall, Paige has been more calm than in the past, which leads us to believe that she is more comfortable now. Here's a picture of her doing a sleep smile.
Here she is being held by mommy.
Aubrey's turn.
Right after I made the previous blog post, Aubrey's nurse discovered some blood in her stomach (before each feeding, they suck out the stomach contents through the girls' g-tube to make sure the milk ins't just sitting there without going into their intestines). The last time this happened to her, her feedings were stopped for a few days and she got a bunch of IV lines put in. Luckily she didn't have too much blood, so her doctor just decided to skip one of her feedings and then resume as normal after that. She hasn't had any signs of bleeding since then, so no one has a clue what happened. At this point, given her history of 4 bleeds, everyone has concluded that she has von Willebrand Disease like her daddy. If you followed that link and read about it, she has Type 1 if she has it. What does that mean for her? She'll get frequent bloody noses until she is an adult, her periods will be heavy, she'll bruise very easily (which may be confused with child abuse, which happened with one of my sisters), and cuts will bleed about 3 times longer than normal.
Like her sister, Aubrey has had a slight increase in her oxygen requirements. She's at 40 mL per minute (up from 30 last post). Her feedings are up to 38 mL every 3 hours (up from 33 last time). She gets bottle fed about twice each day, and the past couple of feedings she has been eating 15 mL. Compared to her sister, she is much more advanced with bottle feeding.
Aubrey is no longer in an enclosed incubator. The top has been raised, and she has been regulating her temperature really well, which means she is ready for an open crib.
Aubrey also got her first series of immunizations today. She didn't enjoy that very much, too say the least. Paige will be getting hers in the next few days, and I'm sure she'll get even more mad than Aubrey.
Weight and height time!
Aubrey:
Day 1 - 2 lbs 2 oz 14 inches
Day 8 - 2 lbs 7 oz
Day 17 - 2 lbs 11 oz
Day 27 - 3 lbs 1 oz
Day 36 - 3 lbs 4 oz
Day 1 - 2 lbs 2 oz 14 inches
Day 8 - 2 lbs 7 oz
Day 17 - 2 lbs 11 oz
Day 27 - 3 lbs 1 oz
Day 36 - 3 lbs 4 oz
Day 46 - 3 lbs 7 oz 16 inches
Day 56 - 4 lbs 0 oz
Day 62 - 4 lbs 9 oz 16 1/2 inches
Paige:
Day 1 - 1 lbs 13 oz 14 1/2 inches
Day 8 - 1 lbs 12 oz
Day 17 - 2 lbs 2 oz
Day 27 - 2 lbs 10 oz
Paige:
Day 1 - 1 lbs 13 oz 14 1/2 inches
Day 8 - 1 lbs 12 oz
Day 17 - 2 lbs 2 oz
Day 27 - 2 lbs 10 oz
Day 36 - 2 lbs 13 oz
Day 46 - 3 lbs 5 oz 16 1/2 inches
Day 56 - 3 lbs 10 oz
Day 62 - 4 lbs 1 oz 17 1/2 inches
If the girls were singleton births (not twins) and still inside mommy, my phone app says they would be 18 1/2 inches long and 5 lbs 12 oz.
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