2 weeks

Duncan and Tristan are two weeks old today, and both now weigh more than 5 pounds. They have done extremely well in their open cribs without any breathing support, so we're usually allowed to detach them from the monitors while we hold and feed them. All of the focus in the last few days has been on increasing the number of bottle feedings they take, so that their gavage tubes can be removed.


Today they are attempting to "nipple all," meaning that none of their food is given through the tube. If they're successful, they'll move to ad lib feeding -- that's the last step before being discharged and it will allow them (and us) to sleep up to 4 hours. If they can't wake up and suck for all of their meals today, they'll be fed through the tubes and we'll try again tomorrow. Their progress isn't monotonic, but it's steady; the nurses expect that both babies will come home later this week.

From my perspective, the increased bottle feeding is making both boys noticeably more tired. I still only nurse them twice a day -- this won't increase until after they come home. When all of their other food was coming through the tube, both of them were enthusiastic nursers. They would wake up at feeding time and get right to business. Now they both struggle to wake up and to nurse. Tristan is particularly difficult to keep awake. We do a lot of baby calisthenics. And for the last few days I've had to lay him down and let him get cold and mad before he would start. When he finally gets going, he's pretty erratic about how much he takes. Sometimes he drinks 48 mL (more than his allotted amount of 42 mL) and other times he doesn't drink anything.



Duncan, on the other hand, wakes up 15 minutes before each feeding, nurses 42 mL, and goes to sleep. The nurses laugh at him for being so precise; I call him the dutiful son.


At home, we're still in the rhythm of morning and evening trips to the NICU. In between, I'm trying to return to being contributing member of the household. On Friday I finally got my walk to the park (hurray!), and on Saturday and Sunday I finally finished organizing the nursery. Everything is ready and waiting for the babies to get here -- except perhaps me. I'm still guiltily enjoying nearly full nights of sleep. :-)