One Week Old

This will probably be the last post on this blog... moving back over to the "big blog" now since we're officially home as a family of five :)

The past week ended up being insane. I thought it was going to be easy going once we got home from the hospital and were waiting on little P, but it wasn't so much. It was emotional and stressful in that every day we were told "hopefully tomorrow". Friday we were going to visit but I was SO tired, I had about 4 hours of sleep since going into labor Wednesday morning and we figured we'd head up Saturday morning once we were rested, got Maya home, and got a little settled. Saturday they said not to worry about visiting (they knew what a hike we had) because he was on the track to going home for Sunday, but Sunday morning they called to say he wasn't maintaining his body temp and they had to turn on the warmer. I had a breakdown and we went up there, where I was able to hold him finally and feed him and change his diaper. It was totally worth it for that little bit of time spent-and thanks to my pump having a battery attachment I was able to pump on the way out there (might as well since it takes so long) and give him a little breastmilk (which I guess he hogged down that night!)

We were going to go up on Monday hopefully prepared to bring him back with us but he had a higher bilirubin level than they'd like, not high enough to use the lamps but on the higher end of normal so they wanted to recheck him the next day to make sure it was going down and not up. I had a bigger breakdown then since we were told to pretty much prepare as long as his feeding was ok and he was maintaining his temp, which he was. We didn't go up because Ava had a checkup a little after noon, and we'd have another late night of driving coming back (not a fan of driving a dark two lane road with our little bean in the van!) ...we decided to go home, get our bags and everything packed, head to Charleston early to visit regardless of what news we got and just come prepared and hopeful.

We headed out Tuesday morning, and I called on the way to see how he had done the night before-and they said as long as he passed his car seat test he'd be good to come home! Amazing news to us but we didn't even know a car seat test existed so we were kind of frustrated and hoping and praying he'd be fine. Turns out the parameters for the test are absurd and had he failed, he REALLY deserved to still be there! We got there, I popped in to see him, they were able to start the test right away since he had just finished a feeding (perfect timing-otherwise we would've had to wait another 3-4 hours!) and he passed! It was a long afternoon of just waiting around, Patrick took Maya down to this really neat play center and I sat with Ava in the waiting room (neither one of the girls could go into the Special Care Nursery, where he had been moved to Saturday or so).

I'll tell you what-our 6 days, although super stressful to us being there and seeing other babies and hearing their stories really puts things in perspective. I'm so fortunate to have carried them for as long as I did, and to have two babies sleeping in the pack & play next to me is more than I could have hoped for. I'm thankful for all of the support and encouragement we had from family and friends, and for the prayers most of all. That made his stay only a 6 day one! I'm glad it's over though, and that they are both home and we are learning how to be a family of 5. It's definitely had its challenges, especially with Maya, but we'll get there.

In the meantime-here are some pictures!

Here's an honesty shot :) 36 weeks, 4 days before their arrival!

Maya's reaction when Patrick told her the babies were coming!Ava PatrickAva-sooo much hair!
Little P-man
After he had to go under the oxygen hood
Holding Ava for the first time
Went to see him for the first time, before his helicopter ride
Maya is such a good big sister!
Patrick went up to Charleston on Thursday to see little P-this is while he was still on CPAP and a feeding tube
Going home!
Holding my little man finally!
Teeeeeny! 4lbs15oz here-on Monday
Finally together :)