3 Months

The triplets turned 3 months this past week! It is so crazy to think that they are already 3 months, and yet they aren't even at their due date yet. This past week, Nathan was still recovering from a cold and it was 14 days before he was finally able to come back into the NICU and touch the babies again... today was his first day that he was able to hold a baby and it was emotional for him! Another very emotional moment this week was when the nurses and respiratory therapists arranged for Jodi to hold all three babies for the first time ever. This took a lot of coordination and work in order to keep all the babies on their ventilation and stable but it was very successful. Jodi wasn't the only very excited person in the NICU, and many people from the healthcare teams popped in to take a look. 

Liam:

Our oldest little guy had a bit of a rougher week. On Monday during his standard weekly blood work, he had a blood sugar reading that was low. The team started to monitor his blood sugar every 3 hours and did more blood work to check for infection. The infection markers came back negative but every so often Liam would have low blood sugars again. Some sugar was added to Liam's breast milk, but later in the week, his sugars were still periodically quite low. On Saturday, his blood sugar was so low that he needed an IV inserted in order to give him sugar intravenously. More blood work has continued to be done but so far no answers have come up. This is a bit stressful for us as parents, as we would like answers. However, the doctors assure us that it could be "flukey" and isn't necessarily something serious. On Monday, the endocrine specialists will examine Liam to rule out a few more possibilities. 

In the meantime, Liam continues to grow and is still our biggest baby at over 6 pounds! His respiratory supports have not improved this past week, which is to be expected considering all that he has went through this past week. On Friday, the triplets also had another RSV needle to protect them from getting cold viruses. This also is hard on them and they usually have a rougher day- particularly in terms of higher respiratory support needs. On Monday and Wednesday of this week, they are also due for different needles. On Tuesday they are due for their weekly eye exams. All of this will make for a difficult few days for our little sweethearts, but we know that it's all important for them to go through.

Taylor: 

Our sweet little girl is still growing well too, and has also passed the 6 pound mark! She has started to have different types of cries, other than just an "angry cry". It's exciting to see little developmental differences in our babies, although her "sad cry" tugs at our heart strings...

In terms of her respiratory needs, Taylor has not been able to come down on her CPAP settings either this week. It has been frustrating that both Taylor and Liam have stayed the same in the past two weeks, but the healthcare team assures us that this is what often happens with micro preemie babies who have chronic lung disease, as all of ours do. Further, when the babies have any tests, needles, eye exams, etc. during the day, the healthcare team does not try to wean their respiratory settings. The general rule is that the babies should only have one thing happening in a day. Today, the respiratory therapists are trying again to turn down one of Taylor's settings, but it's too early to report whether or not she is tolerating it. 

Malachi:

Our smallest and youngest and sickest little man has been tried on two new types of respiratory machines since the hospital's new machine trial has ended. We have been keeping a close eye on Malachi to ensure that we would advocate for him to go back on that machine if he went "backwards" at all. This was a bit stressful, as we really have to learn the different types of machines in order to keep up and know what exactly is going on. We also had to ensure that the new nurses, respiratory therapists, and doctors were filled in and up to date with the details of Malachi's situation (they usually are). The healthcare team was on board with us to advocate to the administrative team for Malachi (to buy to the new parts needed to put him back on the trial machine). At this point, Malachi is on standard CPAP just like his siblings, which means he controls every breath. His settings, however, are much higher than his siblings. Malachi is doing very well on this so far and his oxygen levels have come down a bit. He still sounds like a wind tunnel and needs a soother to keep the air pressures inside of him. 

Malachi has been growing slowly and is still behind his siblings a fair bit. He is awake way more often than his siblings and quietly looks around with his big blue eyes. We are so thankful for his mostly laid back personality, as he has to put up with a lot! He also likes to snuggle. All of our triplets are starting to really follow sound with their eyes and turning their heads when they are awake and hear us talking.

Thanks for your continued prayers and support for our family!