Quick update

Just wanted to quick drop in and post a brief update. I'm typing 1-handed which is part of the reason I haven't been here much lately. Olivia has been struggling with weight gain. She lost more than they like to see. At 1 week old, she was 5lb 12oz (was 6lb 8oz at birth). So I started pumping my hindmilk (the fattier breastmilk) and syringed fed Olivia that as she nursed (yes, a bit cumbersome). I took her back to the hospital to meet with the lactation consultant a few days later and she was only up to 5lb 13oz. So I started using an SNS feeder while nursing. I put my pumped hindmilk into this (the point behind that is to make sure she's getting plenty of the higher calorie milk.) We went back for another weigh-in 5 days after starting that, and she had only gained a few grams, but still weighing 5lb 13oz at 2wks old. So then I needed to start fortifying my milk in the SNS with some preemie formula.

In addition to all this, I need to track each feed, when & how long she eats, how much she's eating in the SNS, diapers, etc. Plus I am not to let her go longer than 3hrs without a feed. Sometimes she wants to eat more often than that. I also pump after every feed to use that milk for the next SNS feeding so you can imagine that pretty  much most of my time revolves around this whole feeding thing right now.

My kids have all been very slow growers. The older ones were all only around 15lbs at 1 year old (both hubby & I aren't big, poor kids! lol) So Olivia is following in their footsteps. They just want to see her back to her birth weight and once there, I think we'll finally be able to relax a bit.

We go back for another weigh in tomorrow. Please keep Olivia in your prayers that she will start gaining weight & that I can hang in there with all this extra stuff right now. Thank goodness for my kids and their help. They are pretty much helping to run the house as I don't have the time to do a lot of extra stuff lately. They even initated starting school on their own since some of our curriculum is computer based and can be done independantly.

Now that my 1 hand is about to fall off from typing.....here's a pic of Olivia. I've been working on her birth story as time allows so hopefully soon that & more pics will be forthcoming!