Both of my girls are fine but I'm scared of losing them

[VroomieMama]

I gave birth to my girls at 33 weeks last Wednesday. They both are doing good but I'm crying because I'm so scared of losing them.

Its just so hard knowing that they're at the hospital and me being at home.

Just seeing IV sticking out of Jayla's head, a thin feeding tube sticking inside her mouth, and having oxygen in her nose.

And seeing nurses moving the IV around trying to find a good place for it to stay in Evelyn's body, and it seems like she is so used to having needles going in and out of her body after only few days, feeding tube in her mouth and the oxygen in her nose.

Both girls seem to have high tolerance for needles and everything because they just don't cry much and sleep a lot. When they sleep, they seem to be happy because their closed lips looked like they were smiling. It looked like they were not in pain but comfortable.

I feel so limited whenever I hold Jayla or Evelyn because of everything that they have on them and I just wanted to have unlimited amount of time to hold them whenever I want to but I just have to be patient for a little while. I just am scared of having all of that taken away from me.

Nurses assured us that they're going to be fine and I know they will be but I'm really scared, crying and can't sleep right now.

http://s260.photobucket.com/albums/i...view=slideshow

password is 2bundleofjoy

[yogafeet]

Vroomiemama- I send you many .

The NICU is so hard, such a surreal experience, and only understood by parents who have had a child or children in it. It is so hard.

My twins were in the NICU for 6 weeks. The longest 6 weeks of my life. They had a bumpy go of it. It was an emotional roller coaster.

At first all of the cords etc coming from them were so daunting. After a while I barely saw them. I know I was scared holding them when they still had the arterial line in their belly buttons b/c if it fell out they would bleed from an artery. Once that was out I felt better.

I was able to breastfeed them and I still am. That will get easier closer to them hitting "term". They were very sleepy for a long time and were fed by tube and then by bottle while I would try once a day with each of them.

That said, here we are at 16 mos., all caught up developmentally, so healthy and joyful. You will get there.

I think being a preemie parent has made me a better parent that I perhaps would have been. For that I am thankful for the experience, even though I wish it had never happened.

Can you keep us updated on Jayla and Evelyn's progress?

FYI- we need a password to see the pics of your babies!

[VroomieMama]

Originally Posted by yogafeet

Vroomiemama- I send you many .

The NICU is so hard, such a surreal experience, and only understood by parents who have had a child or children in it. It is so hard.

My twins were in the NICU for 6 weeks. The longest 6 weeks of my life. They had a bumpy go of it. It was an emotional roller coaster.

At first all of the cords etc coming from them were so daunting. After a while I barely saw them. I know I was scared holding them when they still had the arterial line in their belly buttons b/c if it fell out they would bleed from an artery. Once that was out I felt better.

I was able to breastfeed them and I still am. That will get easier closer to them hitting "term". They were very sleepy for a long time and were fed by tube and then by bottle while I would try once a day with each of them.

That said, here we are at 16 mos., all caught up developmentally, so healthy and joyful. You will get there.

I think being a preemie parent has made me a better parent that I perhaps would have been. For that I am thankful for the experience, even though I wish it had never happened.

Can you keep us updated on Jayla and Evelyn's progress?

FYI- we need a password to see the pics of your babies!

Thank you and yes its difficult. Today, I'm staying home just to rest because I haven't really been able to since I got home last Friday.

I'm sorry, the password is 2bundleofjoy .

[yogafeet]

They are beautiful!!!!!!!!!! :

[henriksmom]

VroomieMama, they are beautiful. Congratulations!

It is hard to protect our little ones when we are not with them.

I could not handle seing the IV's in my son's body too. I was so emotional. It is and will be very difficult. My son spent 58 days in three different hospitals. I cried when I had to leave him there. I cried a lot during that time. The hospital called a social worker to come and talk to me, I must have been a wreck.

I worried constantly but try not to since it may affect your milk production. Try to sleep now since your twins will be a handful. Take care of yourself.

[~bookcase~]

wow it's hard work to have babies in hospital. i really felt i could die from the grief of separation and didn't feel like the staff understood that. i felt from their perspective mothers leave six week old babies and go back to work.
I DON'T do that. never have. it is gut wrenching to have separation enforced on you. but you will survive this and have snuggles and cuddles and sniffs of your sweet babies soon, God willing. (it's never soon enough unless it's now though, i know!!!!!!!)

going through scbu has probably taught me more than i know, more than i'd care to know, but what i needed. never a day goes by that i don't celebrate my babies existence. it's a miracle. every baby is a miracle, but scbu almost opens your heart to see it more clearly.

to quote yogafeet; it's surreal. it still feels that way to look back on it.

try and anchor yourself a bit with expressing your milk for them. i found that grounding. and when you're with them demand kangaroo care when they are medically stable.

it does get more normal to see all the wires/tubes and hear monitors. it does get less scary as the weeks go by. but it never gets easy. and that's ok.

be strong your precious, precious girls

[VroomieMama]

I woke up feeling very thirsty and couldn't go back to sleep because I was thinking of the girls.

I cried again when I saw them today at the hospital, and the nurses were so wonderful and they gave me a hug. My husband were touched with their compassions and thanked them for it as he was tied up with Evelyn in his arms so he couldn't pull me into his arms to hold me.

The oxygen tubes around their nose came off when I saw them at the hospital. Jayla is off the light treatment for her juandice but Evelyn had to get the light treatment again because her juandice level went back up. The doctors are watching Evelyn closely for her heart murmur, even though they said her heart murmur sounds like its closing up but they plan to keep close attention to her heart just in case if she need surgery to close it. Evelyn also got PICC in her left arm but she was very content when my DH held her in his arms. I had Jayla in my arms today (I mean yesterday afternoon.. its almost 5am here in Virginia).

I also have been pumping milk for them and the nurses at the hospital are impressed with the amount of milk I've expressed for the girls. Jayla is getting 15 cc by bottle and Evelyn is getting 3 cc by feeding tube of my milk.

We will be going to march of dimes class held by one of NICU nurses today at 3:30pm to 4:30pm then we'll spend some time with the girls before going home.

This is also hard on my 6 yrs old daughter because she is upset with the hospital's policy for not allowing children under 12 years old to see babies in the NICU. She kept on saying, "when am I going to see my sisters, it is not fair that I haven't seen them, I just wanna look and say hi to them, I will behave and be good girl in there, I promise". We tried our best to assure her that it'll be all over soon and that she'll get to see and hold both of them and even help me with changing their diapers. She just want to see them NOW.

[~bookcase~]

my dd also had a heart murmur. i remember crying everytime they went back under the lights and everytime i saw a new bit moved or stuck in them.

you're doing fab. try to lie down and rest with your eyes closed even when you can't sleep.

i'm so sorry for your dd. can she peek in through any windows at all?

[yogafeet]

I'm in VA too! What hospital are they in?

[VroomieMama]

My girls are at the INOVA Fairfax Hospital in Fairfax, VA.

The NICU room is few halls down away from the waiting room so my daughter is unable to peek through the window to see any babies. The waiting room is right across from the front desk where the nurse will allow/deny visitors from going through the door. So, at my NICU, all parents must have a hospital bracelet on them at all time with their infant's full name, room number, date of birth and time of birth to be allowed in the NICU. So when I want to go to the NICU, I must show my bracelets (I have two bracelets for each of girls..obviously) to the nurse at the front who has the control over the door. The nurse will call and let other nurses in the NICU room know that I'm coming to visit my girls. And the girls are only allowed to have two visitors (family member or etc) at a time to visit them.

Today my DH and I went to the march of dimes class and we learned a lot. I didn't realize that since my girls are 7 weeks early and we have to remind ourselves that they're still developing as if they're still inside my womb but are doing it on the outside. And we have to remind ourselves that their development pace is going to be slower and different than we are used to than the babies who were carried to full term. I already knew that but I didn't really process that in my head until today. My DH and I agreed that we're going to try to be extra patient with our family/friends who had no experience with premature babies. We have to educate them that our girls' developmental stages are different than full term babies and we hope that they're not going to tell us what to do or whatever we're doing is wrong or etc.

After the class, we visited our girls. As soon as I touched Evelyn, it seemed like she was really happy that I was there because I had my finger in her hand then I had to move so the nurse could get Evelyn out of her bed to put her in my arms. Evelyn cried and when the nurse put her in my arms, she stopped crying and then looked at me for a long time. It was like she was really studying my face and I was really surprised that she was able to do that. She also moved her face around to observe her surroundings then back to my face until she fell asleep. I told the nurse about it and the nurse said, she knows that you're her mommy because she recgonizes your heartbeat from when she was in your belly. I thought to myself, yeah thats true and I forgot about that. I didn't get to hold Jayla today because my DH held her. I wanted to hold her but the nurse said Jayla seemed stressed and needed to be put back in her bed. After the nurse put her back in her bed, Jayla was crying and I just went ahead and held her hand and I noticed that it helped to calm her down and she fell asleep few minutes. The nurse seemed didn't like it when I did that but she saw that Jayla became comfortable and went to sleep so she didn't say anything. I was glad I did that because at that moment, I just knew it would make her calm.

[Blu Razzberri]

[OGirlieMama]

The first days in the NICU are the hardest - seeing all the monitors, IVs, PICC lines, etc. is overwhelming. You're sitting there, fresh from this trauma, fresh from postpartum hormones, and you're thrust into this bizarre environment trying to find your way and trying to be a parent when the amount of parenting you can do is so tiny.

I think it took me a week to 10 days to get accustomed to the environment. Then longer for the IVs and PICC lines to come out. Hopefully with 33-weekers that won't be too far away for you guys. I remember how amazed I was when my girls had their PICC lines out and were just on nasal cannula in an open crib (about 34 weeks GA, I think) and I could just pick them up and hold them. It was incredible. You will get there, and then soon they will be home.

You are going through the hardest time right now. Hang in there and it will get better.

[yogafeet]

Wow, vroomiemama, my girls were at Fairfax for a short period. I had them at Virgina Hospital Center and they each went over to Fairfax for a few days for testing (of course not at the same time!)
That NICU is known as having wonderful care... but I do send to you re: the lack of privacy over there. It must be very hard to deal with all of the other babies and families so close to you and your babes.

PP is right- it's the first week that's the hardest. And I would say the last week to b/c at some point you're just so over it- the hospital, etc.

Getting PICC lines out what huge. You'll get there and it will be wonderful.

[VroomieMama]

Yogafeet, I guess we live really near to each other.

Yes the privacy is so limited but other families there does not bother me because it reminds me that I'm not the only mother there going through this with their baby(ies). But with lack of privacy, I do want to pump my breasts there today with the girls around and I'll ask for temporary walls for privacy.

My dh and I have plenty of time to stay there visiting the girls. My neighbor is going to babysit my daughter all day and she is going to take my daughter out so she could have fun. I'm so grateful to my neighbor!

Yesterday, one of the nurse told me that Jayla is going to be moving to the intermediate care today and Evelyn had echocardiograph yesterday and her heart murmur is closed. Her feeding has increased and is fed by bottle at every other feeding but will be bottle fed exclusively probably today or tomorrow.

Tomorrow I'll be giving them bath and this week, I'll start breastfeeding them. I'm so excited.

Also, they will go through car seat test where they will be evaluated if they can tolerate being in the car seat for 90 minutes and also the nurse will evaluate me and my husband putting using the car seat with the girls.

Nurse told us that we'll be taking Infant CPR class. We thought it was a great idea. Since it has been so long time I've took that class.

[zonapellucida]

They look wonderful mama!!! to you and may they come home quickly!!

[VroomieMama]

Took more pictures of them yesterday and today. They were very sleepy today.

http://s260.photobucket.com/albums/i...view=slideshow

pwd: 2bundlesofjoy

[VroomieMama]

I breastfed Jayla today and she latched on just fine. She looked so satisfied after eating and burped so loudly. : Tomorrow, I'm gonna breastfeed Evelyn and hopefully it'll be successful but at least, I do know that I'll get to kangaroo care with both of them so that is also exciting.

[sarlusan]

Looking at your pictures brings back memories!! Hope everybody is continuing to thrive and grow! Congrats on the breastfeeding!!!

[VroomieMama]

Thank you. Jayla and Evelyn latches on to my breast just fine. I noticed that Evelyn is more aggressive when it comes to latching on my breast and I thought it was wonderful since she is the one who needs more time at the hospital. Jayla is coming home on Wednesday and I hope Evelyn will be home by this weekend.

I honestly don't like the idea of both girls being apart and I wish they both would come home at the same time because I felt like Evelyn would feel safe if Jayla is by her side at the hospital and vice versa.

I just do know that Jayla and Evelyn do have strong bond already because whenever one of them make some noises the other will respond by making noises too. Its so amazing and I love the bond between them. I hope my 6 yrs old will not feel jealous or threatened by this bond but to actually develop bond with them too. I guess I'm getting ahead of myself being worried too much too soon.

[sisteeesmama]

Oh, they are so precious!

I think it's only natural to be worried, to want unlimited time with them, if you didn't feel that way I would think that was wierd, but I think how can you feel any other way?

They will be home soon and life will move forward with all that sweet twin baby love!

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