Monday, October 29, 2007

Caitlin at 11 days old

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When Caitlin first came home from the hospital she was so tiny that one of Skylar's friends thought she was a doll and almost sat his book on top of her. I barely caught him before he actually did it. His response to me was that his sisters had dolls bigger than Caitlin. It was a shock for all of us that she was SO tiny. She weighed 4 lbs. 3 oz. and was 16.5 inches in length. Just a tiny little thing.
Caitlin came home from the hospital after 11 days in N.I.C.U. I have tremendous respect for the nurses and doctors that work in the Neonatal intensive care unit. Caitlin was 5 weeks and 2 days early and ended up being smaller than the doctors thought she was going to be. They assumed she would be around 5 to 6 lbs., but when they got in to take her, via c-section, they found her umbilical cord was tied in a knot. If she had gone full term she probably wouldn't have lived. Thank heaven for modern medicine.
I am grateful that she is healthy and happy. When she came home she slept a lot, I used to have to wake her for most of her feedings. In the N.I.C.U. she had a feeding tube in for a couple of days, she kept pulling it out. They decided to leave it and not feed her that way. We just had to keep trying with the droppers and the bottles. When we brought her home she was eating 2 ounces of milk at each feeding. Quite a job for such a small little girl.