Day 8

It was great to see the twins today.  I continue to be nervous that Avery might sometime experience seizures or other symptoms from brain damage and watching for signs of it happening.  So far she has not done so, but today she seemed fussy and a bit jerky, but the nurses assured me that she was doing ok.  It would actually be difficult to tell if she did seize, because her little nervous system is so immature.  All things considered though, Avery is doing well.  She started eating 2 mL of food up from 1.5, so it seems that her digestive system may finally be starting to work.

Wren had a pretty good day as well.  One negative point for the day for her was she received an echocardiagram to follow up on the heart murmur that she had the other day.  The heart murmur did not resolve itself and she was found to still have  a PDA (patent ductus arterioles, just had to look that up).  As I understand it, it means that a flap on her heart is staying open and not closing like it should.  As a result, the nurses will be administering a drug like ibuprofen for a few days and will scale back her food since the drug will reduce blood flow to her stomach.

Two Places

One thing I think both Shannon and I have noticed with me going back to work is that it's becoming increasingly difficult to find a balance between the things we need to do, our babies in the hospital, and our kids at home.  We have a lot of amazing family who sacrifice a lot to help us with the kids and to allow us to spend time at the hospital, but still I find myself feeling like I need to be two places at once.  I was holding Wren tonight and spending time with her, but it ended up taking  a few hours, and for the second night in a row I missed seeing my kids at home before they went to bed.  I'm not sure yet how to spend time that the babies need while also being there for our other kids who are experiencing this time of change alongside us.