Day 4

Day 4, another day in the books for our little angel!

Today Kale weighed in at 1 lb. 7 ounces. Yep, he lost about 2 ounces throughout the day yesterday. The Docs say this is common, and not to worry. They say that all babies lose weight as they go through the first few days. They would rather see him lose weight than gain at this point. If he were gaining it would be water weight and that would mean he's retaining fluid. They said expect him to lose about 10-20% of his body weight in the first few days/weeks.

Kale hit his 72 hour mark today, which is great! The first 72 hours of life are the highest risk for brain bleeds. After 72 hours they are able to move him around a little more and not be as concerned about the risk of bleeding. Obviously we do not know yet whether or not there are any brain bleeds, we find that out Monday with the ultrasound, so please continue to pray for a great scan!! Throughout the day today he managed well off of his insulin and dopamine. His blood sugar was a little all over the place, but not too much that they needed to re-introduce the insulin. Also, his heart held steady without the dopamine, so that is another great step! He was flipped onto his stomach today, this is to try and reduce the risk of fluid build up in one place from laying still....so he will chill on his stomach for about half the day and then go back to his back. The Doc did an x-ray on his lungs today (he does that daily) and said it looked like he was getting a little too much oxygen, so they turned that down a bit. The ventilator that he is on gives about 900 breaths per minute, and they are very tiny breaths. The risk with the vent is that it could cause too much stress on his lungs and cause them to tear or perforate, which is why they do x-rays every day. So, he is on a lower vent setting now, which has made him do a bit more work on his own to breathe.

Derc and I left the hospital today since I was discharged...needless to say this was a very emotional day for us. It was incredibly difficult to leave the hospital knowing our boy was going to be there for a long time. Tonight we called the hospital for our nightly update and Kale was continuing to hold steady...which is the news we always hope to hear.

We made it home and got settled in with the help of my sister, Sarah. She is hanging out with us for the weekend and helping around the house. It's great to have her here because she is a huge help and continues to help keep up our positive thoughts. She is scrapbooking for Kale's door right now :) We can post pictures or little notes on his door, and she is pretty much a pro at that stuff :)

As always, thank you for your thoughts and prayers, the support we have received is completely overwhelming. We have heard of prayer requests from around the country, and it couldn't make us feel better, it's amazing! Please continue to pray, he has a long road ahead.

Until tomorrow.....g'night!