Reality Check!

I guess knowing that I have three babies and realizing that I have three babies is two different things. Today I had the reality check! I was holding Ellie and giving her a bottle and only 5 feet from me were my beautiful wife and my other two babies. Charlotte and Evan had just finished their bottles and were getting rocked to sleep. Finally, we were a family! As reality was setting in, I had visions of what my life will be like in the near future. A lot of diapers, a lot of bottles, a lot of naps, a lot of baths, a lot of laundry, a lot of laughs, a lot of tears, a lot of prayer, and a whole big pile of love.

Evan has moved in with Charlotte. This morning he left his bachelor pad and incubator to re-unite with his younger sister. It has been 6 weeks since they were together and we got no complaints. I asked the nurse if we would be charge for 3 rooms or 2 now that they were sharing - she laughed and said what do you think!

Ellie's incubator has been cut off - this means she is maintaining her own body temperature and does not need the machine to warm her. Once she gets a little bigger she will be set free from her box. We are not sure if they will put all three together in the open crib - but one of our primary nurses is coming up with a plan to get them all together. Ellie finished her first full bottle today! I fed her for a few minutes and was not getting a whole lot of results - so I turned her over to the nurse and she was able to get her in a better position and make her less relaxed than I was - so she finished.

Ellie passed out after finishing her 1st whole bottle!

You will notice something missing in the pictures of Charlotte. Like Evan, she is now without any oxygen assistance. She was able to ditch the tube today and has been doing just great. Jennifer and I both think she looks a little different - but we are sure they did not switch babies - her poop was the same.

Charlotte with no oxygen!

Mom with two babies - lot of love to go around!

Here's the sleeping arrangements - I wonder how long it will be till they are fighting?

Sleep tight sweet babies - we will see you tomorrow!

Playing Dress UP.

On last nights check-in call, Nurse Jennifer told us that she is going to try Charlotte out in a new bed. We have seen them change from incubator to incubator - that's no big deal. She had to repeat herself when she said that the new bed was an open crib. Charlotte had exceeded the 1600 grams (almost 31/2 lb) required to be able to make the big change. She also had to prove that she was able to keep herself warm with out the assistance of the incubator - and she could with no issues. So big girl crib it is - here's a shot of Charlotte showing off her new crib.

Evan is not far way from the weight limit. He was only 10 grams short. He might make it to an open crib soon. He will get to enjoy open air space and from what the nurse has planned he will get to share a crib with Charlotte. The big crib is already moved into Charlotte's room. They just started adjusting Ellie's incubator down so it will be a week or so before she is set free.
One major change with getting to open cribs or getting the incubator turned down , is they have to wear clothes. And here I was thinking they would stay in diapers and blankets the whole time in the NICU. So finally we get to put some of the clothes we got as gifts to use. We even got a surprise in our room today. We got a gift bag full of preemie clothes. At first we thought it was some that were put in Ellie's room by mistake - but I got the bag out and there was a note to us from the Streetmans (they had triplets a month or so earlier than we did and they are all home now) Thanks for the clothes we will get some miles out of them.

Clothing the babies is (I guess) something a mother enjoys. So Jennifer was all excited about getting to dress up her baby girls. Here's a couple shots of the ladies all dressed up for the 1st time.

Ellie's 1st PJ's

Charlotte's 1st PJ's

Evan wanted no part of the dress up! He was just was trying to get some sleep on what might be his last night alone - at least for a few weeks. Look out Charlotte - here I come!

A clean baby is a happy baby.

Nurse Jennifer was back on shift and you know what that means - baby bathing! Jennifer had a ball tonight washing the trips. I just captured the memories while she worked away. LOTS OF PICTURES - YOU BETTER PACE YOURSELF - THESE MIGHT HAVE TO LAST YOU A COUPLE DAYS!!

EVAN WAS FIRST

WASH TIME - HE HATED IT - THE WHOLE TIME

QUICK SHOT WITH MOM

TIME FOR A DIAPER AND A SHIRT

THROW ON A HAT AND WE ARE ALL DONE - READY FOR SOME DINNER AND A NAP

CHARLOTTE WAS NEXT - SHE, LIKE EVAN, DID NOT LIKE THE CLEANING

SHE DID NOT EVEN STOP CRYING TO TAKE A SHOT WITH MOM

ALL NICE AND CLEAN - SO LETS GET SOME CLOTHES ON

MOM HAS TO GIVE THAT CARROT HEAD A BRUSH

CHARLOTTE IS ALL HAPPY READY FOR BED - AND DINNER OF COURSE

LAST BUT NOT LEAST - LITTLE MISS ELLIE - SHE DID NOT FIGHT THE BATH LIKE HER YOUNGER SIBLINGS - I THINK SHE LIKED BEING NAKED!

LOOK AT THAT HAIR!!!

RELAXED AND READY FOR LOVE

DIAPER AND A HAT AND ALMOST READY FOR BED

QUICK SMILE AND OFF TO NIGHT - NIGHT

JUST CHILLIN' NOW - WHERE'S MY DINNER?

Ellie hits the bottle!

As stated last night, I was planning to hold Ellie today - it had been a couple days so I was willing going to forgo feeding Evan just for some Ellie time. I got Ellie time and a bonus. Jennifer called me just before I got the Hospital and said she had a surprise for me - of course I thought of the last surprise I got - POOPIE DIAPER! Not this time - I was informed that the doctor had written orders for Ellie to get a bottle and Jenn was going to wait for me to get there to give it to her. Not only was she getting a bottle today but they reduced her flow on her oxygen. She still requires some O2 quality (small % above room air -which is what we breath) but less flow - this is good news. She was stuck on a higher flow for about 2 weeks - so it was time to see her get reduced. Sounds like a lot of changes all at once - right. That's what I thought as well, so we will see how she handles change.

Feeding Time!

She seemed interested at first. She was all smiles! But she did not stay interested for long. She got down 1/4 of her feed and then was completely pooped out. I held her for about 30 minutes longer and told her she will get another chance tomorrow - no need to rush things. Here's a couple picts:

Evan got his two bottles today - but both times he only got about half way and then was too tired to finish. Here's a shot as Jennifer was trying to wake him up to finish his dinner.

Charlotte is not have any problems finishing her dinner. She took it down and acted as if she wanted more. Jennifer has to stop and let her catch her breath several times because she eats so fast - she is definitely my little girl - as you can tell I have never met a meal I could not finish. She had her flow reduced today as well. If she does good over the next couple days, then she might come off her O2 assistance. Then she will get two bottles a day. Here's an after shot of her passed out after the feed.

3-24-09 Report

Ellie - She is doing good. Her weight is getting closer to Evan and Charlotte - 3lb 2oz. She is still up and down on her oxygen levels but it is becoming more consistent. She will have to wait until her levels are lower to start on the bottle. Her paci activity has increase - so she is wanting to give the bottle a shot. The nurse gave her a small taste (4cc) with a syringe and bottle nipple. She liked it but is just not ready for the full feed - yet. It has been a couple days since I held her - so she is on the schedule tomorrow.

Charlotte - Looks to be getting bigger everyday. She has been taking down her (1) bottle a day. Jennifer gets to give it to her everyday at 3pm. She is up to 3lb 4.7oz. When know of one trait she has definitely gotten from me - she is a deep sleeper - almost too deep. Sometimes in her deep sleep she briefly stops breathing causing her heart rate to drop. This is normal for preemies and all three do this - but not as frequent as Charlotte. The good news is she recovers on her own with out any stimulation. This is the reason she is still on oxygen - it is suppose to be annoying enough to keep her from sleeping too deep.

Evan - Still trucking. He gets (2) bottles a day. He finishes most of the time but gets real tired. I feed him when I get off work. Today, the nurse did not have his bottle ready and he was having a fit. He first was crying but then he was turning his head mouth open looking for his food. Jennifer came close to him and I thought he was going to bite her - he was real hungry. I did not give him his paci because he would get tired and not be able to finish his bottle. Finally the nurse showed up and down the bottle went. I think he wanted more but they are real strict on the amount they get. His weight is the same as Charlotte 3lb 4.7oz.

Sorry no new pictures.

I'll take a 3 pounder and 2 milkshakes please...

On Thursday we announced Evan and Charlotte broke the 3 pound barrier and that Ellie would be a week or so behind. Wrong! She joined the club last night at weigh-in. She had gotten a transfusion earlier in the week and it has really helped. Her color looks good, her breathing has gotten better, and she has really packed on the weight. She is also getting lasixs to help with her lungs - this should cause her to gain little to no weight - but it has not so far. We are proud of our little girl.

For 5 weeks our babies have been getting fed through a feeding tube. The main reason is preemie babies - especially 28 weekers - can not suck, swallow, and breath at the same time. We have been waiting for the day when they would take the bottle. We were told that usually at 34 weeks (gestational age) they might get to try. They also have to be interested in their pacifiers. 34 weeks would be next Thursday - will we get to start early? You betcha! The doctor wrote the orders today for Evan and Charlotte to get one of their feedings through a bottle. They have been very active with the pacifier and one of our nurses has been saying for a week that she thinks they could take a bottle. Doc wrote the order @ 4:15 - Evan gets feed again @ 5 - so lets get started. The nurse gets the ball rolling showing us how to do hold the baby, how to hold the bottle, how to see if he is sucking, how to see if he is swallowing, and how to see if he is breathing, and then how to burp him. They set a time limit on feeding - 30 min. If they do not get the bottle finished, they have to stop and finish it through the tube - too much time would cause the baby to get too exhausted and burn too many calories. So can Evan do it? Will he know how to do 3 things at once? How much will he get down? Answers - Yes, Yes, and the whole bottle. He was a champ. Jennifer got to take over about 1/2 way through. The smile on her face will last for days.

Charlotte is next. She has probably shown the most interest in the paci. So just as with Evan the nurse gets the feeding started. She was real interested in getting the bottle down. She was not interested in stopping to breath. The nurse let me try and just advised to pull the bottle away every now and then to allow her to remember to breath. She was sucking real hard and after a few minutes she had even learned how to stop and breath on her own. I stopped to burp her and she really let it out - they nurses down the hall could even hear her. After the burping, she got a little tired. We had to stop because she was falling asleep - the 1/2 bottle that had hit her tummy put her to sleep. Don't worry - she will get the rest of the fed through her tube. She will get to try again tomorrow.

How did we get here? Part 3

I left off with Jennifer having a not so enjoyable pregnancy. She could not do much of anything. Going to Target and Babies R Us to register is typically an enjoyable experience for expecting parents - for us a different story. I had to drag her out to the store and then push her around in a wheel chair. We did not know what we were needing and lacked any motivation to finish the task. We usually left the store confused and completely exhausted. I remember the joy we had registering for our wedding gifts - wow that seems like ages ago. We even asked some mothers in our Sunday School class to check it out and tell us what we need to add or delete - They were a big help.

One big bonus to having triplets is all the doctors appointments. I know normally you would think going to the doctor every other week or weekly would be a negative but for us it was a positive. We got to have soooooo many ultrasounds. We got to see the babies growth on a weekly to biweekly basis and that was so neat. Jennifer (being a registered sonographer) found this to be therapeutic. I could tell a difference in her on appointment days - a little more energy - a little more will to get out of bed. For me, every appointment was nerve racking. Right before we would go back, I would have a sickness feeling that something would be wrong only to be followed by a good news and a thankful prayer to God when everything was going good.

Here's a picture of Jenn @ 20 wks.

From the day we found out about having triplets, we were prepared for an early arrival. The average gestational age for triplets is about 31weeks. We looked at the calender - Due date is May 7 - 32 wks is March 12. I set a goal of March 13th. That was my dad's birthday. Jenn and I have a favorite story we tell just about everyone after they find out we are having or just had triplets. Story - My dad started telling Jennifer as early as High School that one day we would have triplets. His theory was always - One for Larry and Annette, One for he and mom, and one for Jenn and I. He continued this prediction for several years. I know that if he were still with us he would be boasting (as he usually was doing) about how he knew it was going to be triplets. I just know that he is spending a lot of time in the NICU watching over his little triplets.

As before, I will continue our story later.

Baby Update:

No major changes today. We found out that we can request certain nurses to care for our trips when they are working. So of course, we have our favorites and they all are very different. The night shift is most important to us - usually no doctors hanging around - and we are at home trying to get sleep - much easier to do when you know your babies are in good care. One of the day nurses that we have requested is really fun. She is great with the babies and keeps us entertained all day.
I think Ellie took missing out on the 3lb party personally - she has really started gaining and is only 1.1oz away from hitting 3 lb. Will she do it tonight?

Here are some of today's action photos:

Charlotte - her face is really filling out - it is much rounder than EJ or Ellie

Ellie got some Kangarooing time with mom - she kept lifting her head to see her mommy

Evan was really active today - his eyes were dancing around the room.

Ha Ha caught you looking - no post today!

Even Evan is making fun of you for looking! Put your tongue back in boy - that's not nice!

Who do you think hit the 3 lb mark first?

Evan? Charlotte? Ellie?

Well you have a 2 out of 3 chance of getting it right.

Charlotte and Evan both past the 3 lb mark last night at weigh-in. The nurse knew we were waiting for this day, so she weighed both twice to make sure it was right. They both weighed in @ 3 lb 1/2 oz. Ellie did her best and came in @ 2 lb 12.5 oz. She has actually gained the most weight if you consider she lost down to under 2 lb. She is getting extra calories added to her mommy juice - so it won't be long before she's the old and bigger sister. Then again she looks like she is going to favor Jennifer - so a petite life may be in store for her. They all have been having really good days. It is possible that they might get to start bottle feeding in the next week or so. Jenn and I can't wait to be able to hold and feed, but for now we will just enjoy holding. Here are today's pictures - can you see the extra weight?

Ellie

Charlotte

Evan