1 Week Post Op

It has now been 1 week since surgery. Getting Noelle back up to her full feeds has been very slow going. Before surgery we were feeding her 29mLs every three hours. After surgery we had to slowly increase her feeds back up to her full feed, they started back at 7mLs per feed and very gradually increased her back to 29mLs. We have also been adding in calories to the pumped milk to help her gain weight. Many WHS kids struggle with weight gain, and since she is now two weeks old and has only gained 1 oz from her birth weight we are adding in calories to help her out.

The last couple of days we have been feeding her all of the 29 mLs per feed, she usually takes a few feeds of about 10 mLs by bottle and then we tube feed her the rest of her feed. She has a very weak suck so it is hard for her to get much out of the bottle, although her suck has improved greatly over the past two weeks. We are hopeful that over time she will get strong enough to take a full feed by bottle without our assistance of expressing milk. 

Since she is only taking some feeds by bottle we have been tube feeding her the rest. We have discovered over the past couple of days that the way we were feeding her was perhaps a little too fast and did not allow ample time for her stomach to absorb the milk. (we were gavage feeding) The plan now is to put her on a pump that will administer her feeds over a longer period of time to help make digesting the food easier on her and her tummy. 

We hope that this will work...as soon as we work out this feeding issue and she gains weight she can come home! YAY! 

We are ready to have her home where we can take care of her and not have to juggle schedules to get up to the hospital. Her sisters miss seeing her and want her home and they really want mom and dad home more too. We are so thankful that Grandma Jones has been able to come stay with us and help out with the kids. I can't imagine doing all this with out her help. Thanks Mom/Kim/Grandma!