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From:
Lisa Cote [mailto:
ljcote@snet.net
]
Sent:
Monday,
September 30, 2002
6:48 AM
Subject: Update on Ben 9-30-02
Hi everyone,
Here’s the latest on our little Ben.
He had a pretty good week. Thursday
and Friday I was able to hold him using the “Kangaroo Care” method.
This is when the baby lays right on my bare chest (actually, he’s so
tiny that they just tucked him into my shirt!)
so we are touching skin to skin. He
really seemed to enjoy it (and so did I!!) – he was very relaxed and even made
sucking noises (amidst the ventilator and stomach tube in his mouth..) What a
wonderful feeling it was – I was able to feel his little head under my chin
and sing to him and smell him…just amazing…I can’t wait to do it again.
He
still has the stomach tube in that is helping his intestines function – he’s
had this in since his surgery and they’ve attempted to take it out a couple of
times, but each time he hasn’t tolerated it well and they’ve put it back in.
They tried taking it out again on Saturday night, but again, he wasn’t
able to move things along on his own so it’s back in again.
The nurse said it could be the fact that he is still on the Morphine
which tends to slow things down so they started weaning him off of that a
little. Perhaps they’ll try to
take out the tube in a few days…
They also began giving him a round of steroids yesterday to help his lungs
develop. The nurses said that some
premees have difficult reactions like rapid heart rate, high blood pressure,
etc…to the steroids. So far, his
first round went fine and he tolerated it pretty well.
I’m not sure when his second round will be (perhaps today), but we’re
keeping our fingers crossed that it helps him so he can be less dependant on the
Ventilator. His lungs are pretty
sick right now and still have some fluid in them (which they try to suction out
daily it seems..).
They
weighed him Thursday night and he has gained an ounce.
We’re glad he’s not losing at least.
He still is not taking any breast milk since his surgery, but we’re
hoping that will change sometime this week.
He’s surviving on “lipids” and the intravenous fluid right now.
Once he can begin eating…he should begin gaining more.
That’s
pretty much it right now. If
anything major comes up I’ll send another update, otherwise I’ll probably
keep these to a once a week thing. Thank
you again for all of your prayers and support.
Please keep it coming, Ben has a long way to go…
Love and peace,
Lisa
Cote
This
next email was also sent on September 30th regarding visiting our little
one...
From:
Lisa Cote [mailto:
ljcote@snet.net
]
Sent:
Monday, September 30, 2002
6:55 AM
Subject: Visits to the
hospital...
Hi again
everyone,
It’s
been so nice to have people come with us to visit our little guy in the
hospital…and we know there are still so many of you who still haven’t
gotten a chance to see him…Because Jeffrey is back working full time and
Adam and Tori still need us very much…we’re trying to arrange some type of
schedule that would work around everyone and give folks a chance to see Ben.
So we came up with two nights a week that we could bring visitors in
with us – Mondays and Wednesdays between
6pm
and
8pm
. Visiting hours end at
8pm
so we need to keep that in mind.
Jeffrey
and/or I would be happy to meet folks at UCONN during these times – just let
us know ahead of time since only 2-3 visitors besides us can come into the
NICU unit at a time…Please call us or email me and we’ll work something
out. The NICU nurses are pretty
strict about people with colds (including me – I’ve had to wear a face
mask and limit my visit to 15 minutes this weekend since I’ve had a cold…)
so keep that in mind too.
Anyway,
let us know – we’d love to share our little guy with you.
Just let us know.
Love,
Lisa
Cote
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