The Sattler Scoop: Transitions

Today marked a big day for our sweet girl. After 65 days in the NICU she was moved to Special Care! At Presby Dallas, this is the special floor for babies that have been in the NICU and are now stable enough to require a lesser degree of care. This is also the next step toward taking Casey home! She now has a private room and the nurses here will work with us to get ready for caring for her on our own. We also have the option of staying overnight with her (I am already trying to mentally prepare myself for the sleepless nights that come with staying in the hospital again when I stay this weekend). Although we are ecstatic that she is doing so well, it also means that this week we had to say goodbye to all our wonderful NICU nurses. We especially will miss Casey's three amazing primaries, Lindsey, Amanda, and Lauren, who have taken such great care of our girl and been so invested in her care. It will be a big change to get used to new faces caring for our daughter, but we knew this day was coming soon since her doctors started mentioning the possibility of moving her if she did not have a reaction to her two month vaccinations on Friday. Yep, you read that right, the Doodlebug is now 2 months old!

In other Casey news, she had her latest eye exam on Monday, and her eyes are looking about the same for now. The doctors have reassured us that this is still normal for her gestational age and they should clear up on their own by the time she is full term. For now, they will continue to test them every two weeks. She has been attempting two bottles a day, and is consistently taking between 25-35 mLs of her 44mL feeds. Now that she is in Special Care they will start cue based feeding, or attempting bottle feeding whenever she is alert and awake at her feeding times instead of automatically starting her other 6 feeds through her feeding tube. The morning after my last post she hit the 4 lb milestone, and her current weight is 4 lbs 13 oz! I guess it won't be long until I have to stop referring to all those 5 and 6 pounders in the unit as "chunkers," especially since tonight when we dressed her, we discovered that she has already outgrown many of her cute preemie clothes.

One of the biggest highlights of the past week is that my amazing friends, Alicia and Amber, hosted the most adorable baby shower for me. It was so wonderful to catch up with so many of our friends and family, and we are so blessed to have such an incredible support system who we know are faithfully praying for us each day. I can officially say we are pretty much set now with all the necessities of bringing Casey home! Many people have asked when that will be. Her major hurdle now is to take 8 full feeds by mouth and to continue gaining weight. She will also have to be brady free (meaning no apnea/bradycardias or big heart rate drops) for 5 days and she will have to pass her car seat test before she can be released. Our biggest prayer needs now are for her to continue to make progress with her feedings, for her eyes to mature, and for her exhausted parents to squeeze in as much rest as possible (between me getting up to pump every few hours and Brian finding the time to study for his upcoming P.E. exam, this 5 hours of sleep thing is definitely starting to take a toll on both of us).
Here are the pictures from this past weekend and of course the latest of Casey: