Splish splash, we're having a bath!

Anna had her first bath today!! We just can't believe how relaxed everything is in a level II in comparison to a level III NICU. Not only did she get her first bath today, but she also got to have a break from her COT monitor (this is the machine that monitors her desaturations) for over an hour! This was her first time off the COT machine and the nurse on duty today mentioned that as she progresses they will slowly keep her off of it during her feeds and baths etc to sort of get us and her used to not having to rely on a monitor.

The nurse on duty today was really wonderful today too. She was so supportive of bottle feeding our baby and she even mentioned that they will probably start her on the first bottle tomorrow with the approval of the Neonatologist. She emphasized that the main criteria for Anna to come home is to be able to eat on her own for 48 hours straight. This will take some time for her to master, but it's not unheard of that a baby might go home well before their due date (40 weeks). In fact, she mentioned that many babies go home well before they even reach full term (37 weeks). That's really comforting to hear because it means that just because she is not full term, doesn't mean that she can't be just as healthy and thrive just as much as one that is full term. Also, it means that we might have her home as early as 36-37 weeks if she does well with her feeds. She is now 34 weeks and 1 day old so that's just around the corner for her if she does as well as she has been for the last 8 weeks.

Anyways, as you can see from the pictures, we are still suited up for isolation. We had some fun with our outfits today to make light of the fact that it was so uncomfortable. Apparently when her first cultures come back tomorrow we can ditch the masks. But the gloves and gowns have to stay probably until Saturday's visit still.

Oh, but the big news today (other than her first bath) is that she is now on feeds that are every 3 hours and they have upped her milk to 42 mls now to compensate for the increase in the time. It still runs through a one hour course but I'm sure eventually that will be decreased to half an hour as well. She also now weighs 1983 grams which is about 4lbs 6oz!

Here she is getting her hair washed before her bath (the quality is not so good compared to the prior videos and there is no sound; but that's because I wasn't supposed to be video taping but I just had my little still picture camera in my hand pretending to be taking pictures without flash the whole time muahaha!) :



Here she is having her quick bath, it looks rough but it's not. The nurse had to hurry it along because Anna is still a bit fragile and it is quite cooler in this hospital:



She did really good today and she barely let out a couple of squeaks, she has such a cute demeanor still! :) She is also really handling being in Oshawa well. I think she is loving how much quieter this NICU is than her last one. So we are very relieved, the nurses are nice, they are not bullying us into anything, the place is bigger, cleaner, newer and Anna seems very content with her new home!

Marta & Arthur