heavy hitter.

It has been over a week since the last post and things they are a changin'. 

As of Thursday, July 21 (day 58), Pepper is more than double her birthweight weighing in at a whopping 3lbs 8.7oz and the extra weight has been really great for her.  We feel like the bigger she gets the more stable she is and the little changes just affect her less.  The docs have been weening the flow, now at 0.5, which is really nothing, and we look for them to take her off completely in the coming weeks as long as other things go smoothly.  She has remained at 21% oxygen and yesterday was getting 10.5 cc's of breastmilk per hour (8.5 fl oz per day).

Today is a big day as she started bolus feeds.  (for the second time)  (the first was last Friday and it didn't go so well so we're just not going to revisit that, mmkay?)  Bolus feeding is where they give Pepper 3 hours worth of milk over a 2 hour period and then give her 1 hour break with no milk at all.  The goal is to get her used to eating meals once every couple of hours instead of continuously.  This will also stretch her stomach out so that she can have larger quantities that will last her longer.  They will eventually stretch the amount of food she gets at one time as well as the length of time that she's not eating, so in a few weeks she may be getting 3 hours of food over 30 minutes with 2.5 hours with no food.  Made up numbers, but something like that.

All in all good things, big changes, growing baby, happy parents...

day 56, 07.19: frozen in a dream

day 56, 07.19

day 56, 07.19

day 57, 07.20: lovin the monkey feet.

day 57, 07.20: a little dad + daughter time.