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The Twins New Regimen and Saying No
Jan. 26th, 2012 12:39 pmTalking to a new mother who has twin daughters in the NIC-U provides some interesting insights. Prior to their first feedings by mouth, the girls were maintained through their IVs.
Their first feeding, called a "gut test" in hospital slang, consisted of a carefully-measured portion of breast milk which was then allowed to pass through the baby's digestive tract while carefully monitoring for indications of the baby's ability to actually process it, i.e., gain nutrients from it, etc..
Both kids successfully passed this stage and the process continued with incremental additions of milk and corresponding reductions in IV solution. In Amelia's case, she started with 5 cc. milk and added 2 cc. at each increase. Layla started with 3 cc. and added 1 cc. at each increase. Amelia is now up to 8 cc. per feeding and Layla is up to 5 cc. as of yesterday. And I'm sure that this demonstration of nutritional viability has contributed as well to the recent upgrading of the girls' overall status.
Tonight, after the twins' last direct-from-mom feeding, and providing that our daughter isn't too tired, we're taking the new parents out to dinner. When Little J heard this, he wanted to know if he could stay over and go with us.
I explained to him that this was something special that Grandma wanted to do for his aunt and uncle and that sometimes we make things special by including only that person.
Then I said that since this was Grandma's idea I would ask her how she would feel about having him come along. He looked at me confidently and said, "That's OK, Poppa, because Grandma never says no to me!"
"Yeah, you're probably right," I told him. Which, I guess, is OK too because it means we both understand that Poppa does sometimes say no. And "makes it stick."
LPK
LiveJournal
1.26.2012 (b)
Their first feeding, called a "gut test" in hospital slang, consisted of a carefully-measured portion of breast milk which was then allowed to pass through the baby's digestive tract while carefully monitoring for indications of the baby's ability to actually process it, i.e., gain nutrients from it, etc..
Both kids successfully passed this stage and the process continued with incremental additions of milk and corresponding reductions in IV solution. In Amelia's case, she started with 5 cc. milk and added 2 cc. at each increase. Layla started with 3 cc. and added 1 cc. at each increase. Amelia is now up to 8 cc. per feeding and Layla is up to 5 cc. as of yesterday. And I'm sure that this demonstration of nutritional viability has contributed as well to the recent upgrading of the girls' overall status.
Tonight, after the twins' last direct-from-mom feeding, and providing that our daughter isn't too tired, we're taking the new parents out to dinner. When Little J heard this, he wanted to know if he could stay over and go with us.
I explained to him that this was something special that Grandma wanted to do for his aunt and uncle and that sometimes we make things special by including only that person.
Then I said that since this was Grandma's idea I would ask her how she would feel about having him come along. He looked at me confidently and said, "That's OK, Poppa, because Grandma never says no to me!"
"Yeah, you're probably right," I told him. Which, I guess, is OK too because it means we both understand that Poppa does sometimes say no. And "makes it stick."
LPK
LiveJournal
1.26.2012 (b)
