Katherine's Life: Daddy's Update

Hey friends and family,

"Daddy" here, giving you an update on our little girl and sharing a bit from our perspective on how things are going.

We've been happy to hear all good news about Katherine. The doctor most recently told us that she's doing almost as well as a full-term baby when it comes to her lungs and jaundice and that we can expect her to be in the hospital for much less than three weeks. How long that is depends on how well she gains weight between now and then.

So her lungs are awesome. She can scream with the best of them! The nurses have even said they hear her very well when she's upset with her isolet closed up.

Katherine's bilirubin count and jaundice has been coming down thanks to the photo therapy she's been getting the last couple of days. In fact, the light has been on the lower of two settings and is still getting the job done. We can expect the photo therapy to be complete in the next couple of days.

She's eating better thanks to a small plastic device that Glenda uses while nursing. Miss Katherine has a better target to latch onto with it and nursed a lot better and for longer each time today. She even does better if she can get started with it and then it's taken away a short time later. They expect that after a while she won't need it at all.

We hope to see some good weight gain from her in the next several days. She backslid a little, then gained a little, and then backslid a little, so we have yet to see consistent improvement. The doctor did say, however, that when Katherine starts gaining weight consistently then she'll be able to move to a regular crib. That's great news, but we also want to make sure that she's making really good gains before moving so that she'll be less likely to backslide and head back to the isolet.

Benjamin seems to be holding up pretty well under the circumstances. He's been his typical self and hasn't really shown any noticeable signs of stress or frustration. I think it helps that he gets to come home every night and sleep in his own bed. We're hoping that going to school this week will be good for him, keeping as much normalcy in his life as possible.

He does love his sister a lot and really thinks she's cool. He likes to go down to the nursery and just watch her sleep and especially likes being able to see her awake and touch her when she comes out of the isolet for nursing. It was so cute the other day: He very sheepishly mentioned that he might want to call her something other than "Katherine." I guess he thought he'd get in trouble for calling her something else. I told him that it's fine to call her something else, and he said he'd kind of like to call her "Katie." He hasn't since then, but he now has parental permission if he wants to. :-)

Glenda and I are hanging in there. I'll be honest. It's been rough on us.

For her it's been spending nearly all her time at the hospital. When I say that, I mean that she's reluctantly left once for an hour Saturday since having the baby Tuesday. Living in a place that's so sterile and un-homely takes its toll and I've been trying to encourage her to get out, even if it's just for an hour or two at a time max.

I've gotten to the point that I cringe at the prospect of going back there. I want to see my wife and baby but have no interest in seeing that place. We've been there so many times since labor day weekend and spent SO much time there since the baby was born that I'm tired of it. My stress level rises higher and higher the longer I'm there. It felt really good to come home this evening even though I hated having to leave my two favorite ladies there.

So in summary, it's stressful but finite. Katherine is improving but we hate having to deal with any of this in the first place. But know it's best for her.

So keep us in your thoughts and prayers and please visit if you get the chance. Visitors really do brighten up our day.

Smiles,
Michael

Oh yeah, can't have a blog post without some pictures: