Thursday Evening (12/16)

First of all I would like to say a very big thank you to everyone for the prayers, calls, messages, etc.  We are truly in awe of everyone's thoughtfulness and encouragement.  Silas had another great day.  We had to leave him around noon today though and we headed home.  I was glad to be released from the hospital but sad to leave Silas behind.  It was hard but I am going back tomorrow so that makes it a little easier.

Things that have changed since yesterday:  he is no longer on a cpap machine.  This machine laid on top of his nose and made sure there was plenty of good air for him to breathe.  It did not breathe for him, it was just sort of like having a fan on your face.  People with sleep apnea wear these things.  They decided he didn't need that, so they removed it.  Every once in a while he will forget to take a breath and they will nudge him and he will breathe again.  This scares me a lot but to the nurses it is no big deal and very very normal for someone as small as he is and very normal even for preemies who are bigger than he is.  If he starts doing this a lot, they will put the cpap back on.  The good news is that the cpap and the ventilator are two very different things and overall he is doing an awesome job of breathing on his own, so even if he does start wearing the cpap again it is really nothing to worry about.

His jaundice levels have gone down so they are expecting to take him off of the bili lights soon.  Right now he is wearing a mask for the jaundice and was still wearing the cpap when I left.  It was hard to see his face with all of that stuff on it.  I am hoping to see him wearing nothing on his face (except for his small feeding tube) when I get back to the hospital tomorrow. 

I was able to help give him a bath last night.  It was really more of a wipedown than a bath but the nurse showed me how to wipe him with a special bathing wipe and clean him up.  He was very calm during the whole thing and liked it.  He is so sweet.  He opened his eyes and looked at me last night.  That made me happy. 

The girls were very happy to have me home.  We had missed each other so much.  They just hugged and hugged me.  If anybody has any tips on how to be in two places at once, please let me know...