Well God's timing is hilarious to me sometimes. This morning my sweet sister offered to watch Lydia so that Jonathan and I could go to church together before he's out of town for forever. My mom went home for this week so that Jonathan and I could try this parenting thing just the two of us, so we were grateful for the extra help. Just before the service started I got a shooting pain in my neck (not Jonathan..this was an actual pain) which I recognized as some residual weak muscle from a car accident I had a few years ago. This has happened once before where the muscle that controls the right side of my upper body just goes on strike and I can't raise my arms, turn my head, lean back, lean forward, swallow too hard...you get the picture...without the muscle seizing up and causing sharp pains.
As you can imagine this makes taking care of a baby impossible. And now Jonathan has 2 babies at home and one at the hospital. Except I'm probably more of a toddler. I have to walk very slowly and cautiously and I keep trying to do things that I shouldn't do so that he has to make sure I don't hurt myself trying to be independent. It's a comical scene but not an ideal one for the situation we're in.
Normally I would take muscle relaxers and rest but because I'm breastfeeding that complicates taking medicines. The whole breastfeeding is another issue in itself because I can't physically feed Lydia or even pump without pain. The question of when to stop the pumping has been hanging over our heads for a few weeks now as we try to find balance,and I'm afraid this may end up being the deciding factor. See how hilarious God is sometimes? A dear friend who is a massage therapist is coming over tomorrow afternoon sometime to see if she can help the muscle relax, but until then Jonathan is going to need a LOT of extra prayer for stamina, patience, and supernatural rest.
OK, enough about the big baby (that's me). The girls are both doing very well. Penny gained up to 1710g which is 3 lbs 12 oz. She took 15 ccs (that's right...half of her feeding) from Jonathan from a bottle last night which is HUGE! She's still a little tachypnic (fast breathing because of her lung disease) but seems to be slowly improving there as well. It's just a longer road for her. There is a big decision to be made about when to do her hernia surgery. When she has this surgery she'll have to be intubated again which could mean more damage to her little lungs. We had hoped that we could wait for a few months for her lungs to develop before having to put her through being intubated again, but these hernias are very very large and it's not regular practice for the hospital to send babies home with such bad hernias for fear of complications. Also the doctor said that a few months wouldn't make very much of a difference in her lung health to outweigh the risks of taking her home and then having to put her back in the Pediatric ICU instead of the Neonatal ICU (where all of her favorite nurses and doctors are who know her and her situations). Anyway, your prayers are coveted here as Jonathan and I make yet another difficult medical parenting decision.
Lydia is still thriving. She's starting to wake up sooner and hungrier so I anticipate a growth spurt soon. She's still weighing in around 6 and a half pounds. We are having a little bit of difficulty with gas and some painful little digestion issues, but nothing out of the ordinary or excessive for a newborn (even if she is almost 3 months old).
Specific Prayer
- My neck to heal miraculously quickly so I can get back to being a mama
- Jonathan to have supernatural strength (even more than his superdad/superhubby abilities)
- Penelope's lungs to heal and her breathing to improve
- Penelope's bottle feeding attempts to continue to improve without any setbacks
- Penelope's hernia surgery decision
- Lydia's little gassy self
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