Feelin' the Love

Today was a better day!  :)  Baby wasn't as irritated, she seemed to be back to her normal self.  She cried when she wanted to be fed, and all other times was super calm.  She even laid in her crib on her back super content just looking around and kicking her feet for like an hour.  I thought that since it was only an ear infection, that we would be closer to going home....but the resident doctor came in and talked to me today.  He told me that because of her oxygen levels, we are kind of in a holding pattern.  She's not really getting better, but she's not getting worse either.  She's still requiring like .40 liters of oxygen per minute....which is WAY more than she needed at home, and they want her to be closer to her home parameters before she can leave.  There were times today that they were able to turn her down to .20 for a while, but right now it's back up to the .40 she's been hanging out at.  I just remember it took us so long to try and wein her oxygen in the NICU....I hope it's not that long over here!  As much as it sucks to be in the hospital....I'm really ok with it!  I mean, I'd 100% rather be at IMC with the nurses and people I love so much, but if she's going to be sick, I'd rather she be in a place that can help her when she needs it, than at home.  I was telling Ova....we're going to laugh later on down the road when she's the most healthy out of all our kids...lol.  This weekend Ova's brother is getting married and all his family is coming from out of town and staying at our house.  I think it's a tender mercy from God that she's in here....I know that sounds cruel and mean, but I'm serious.....that would be just way too many people around her, and much more risk of her getting sick.  Gotta focus on the positives right??!!







Today I had a lot of visitors and I was loving it!  First my good friend Michelle stopped by.  I actually haven't seen her in forever....she found out that my baby was in the hospital and since she was bringing her daughter here for an appointment she stopped in to see me.  It was so nice seeing her and catching up.

Then I got a text message from one of my NICU mom friends, Jenna, that she was coming up to visit me because she had something for me.  She's has a little miracle baby Jack that's still in the NICU right now.  Her little guy has almost the same beginning as my baby Katea.  He was born at 25 weeks, weighed only 1lb12oz at birth, but he is doing amazingly awesome right now and is almost 7lbs!  She is one of my really good friends from the NICU and everytime we'd see each other we'd always stop and ask how each other's kid was doing.  We'd celebrate with each other the good days and give each other encouragement on the bad ones.  She was my scrapbooking buddy!  :)  Her husband is so nice, he has that super sarcastic sense of humor....I think he'd get along great with my husband!  haha  They are such good people and I have no doubt that we crossed paths for some reason.  Jenna is one of the sweetest people I've met!  I was so happy when she stopped by today.  She brought me lunch and she also brought me this:

It's a scrapbook book that my IMC people made for me and baby Katea.  They passed it around and everyone wrote little get well notes to her.  See why I love them so much!  :)  I totally cried when I read it!

Then, as if that wasn't enough love for one day....I got even more IMC love!  :)  Christa, another NICU mom and a parent volunteer now text me to see what I wanted for lunch.  I told her not to worry about it because Jenna had already brought me food, but that if she wanted she could still come visit me.  Christa is such a sweet girl, funny thing that I only met her once on a Wednesday night at one of the parent support classes....but we've become really good friends....I've noticed that a lot with other NICU moms I've met....we all are instantly best friends because we can relate to each other.  Christa is always positive and upbeat and she always cheers me on when baby Katea has her bad days.  She's the one that started the IMC NICU parent page on facebook and is constantly doing things to try and be there for moms that are struggling with the NICU life.  She came up and visited me, and even though we only met that once....and didn't even talk that much the night we met, we sat here and talked for hours.  We were talking about our experiences, she was asking me questions about what I liked and appreciated that the parent support group did for me while I was there.  We talked as if we had been friends forever.  She's such a sweet girl!  She also brought me some goodies, and this cute little tile plaque that she made:

I absolutely love it and it actually has so much meaning.  This is the saying that is on the wall above the door as you enter the NICU.  I saw this every single day for 4 1/2 months.  Dr Seuss is right, a person's a person no matter how small!  :)

The night ended perfect with my little family.  Ova told me that they were laying on the bed and Lautala just started crying....he said she was crying so hard, that he couldn't console her.  He just let her cry for a little bit and when she finally calmed down, he asked her what was wrong.  She said "I want Mommy"....that broke my heart.  She is such a mama's girl and I haven't been around for her lately.  I asked Ova to bring the kids to the hospital and we'd eat dinner together in the cafeteria.  They came, we ate, and then we brought them up to see their baby sister for like 5 minutes.  This is the first family picture we've ever taken with all of us together!  I love it!