Friday

Mia had an interesting day today. The doctors have cut back her feeds to 24 cc's every 3 hours because she is processing them too fast. How do they know? Apparently they've been testing her stool for sugar and hers still has sugar in it. If she were fully processing all the nutrients out of her feeds she wouldn't have any sugar in her stool. The doctors are hoping that by cutting back on the amount of food she'll get all the good stuff out of it.

Thursday

What a wonderful day for Mia! We found out today that she does not have a bone infection! As a result, they have taken her off of her antibiotics. The ear, nose, and throat specialists reviewed her CT scan and found the blockage in her right nasal passage to be mostly bone matter, but are in no hurry to fix it. There were no other concerns from them regarding her CT scan. She is also almost to her goal feedings, she is now at 44 cc's every 3 hours...her goal is 48 cc's every 3 hours. She tried bottle feeding today and was able to suck down 10 cc's before she got too tired, so the plan is to keep on working with her at that so she is able to feed completely by bottle at some point.

Right now the only other possible concern the doctors have with her is her kidneys. When she was born they did an ultrasound on her kidneys and observed an excess of fluid, so they are planning a follow-up ultrasound to see if she is still retaining excess fluid. That should happen in a day or so.

Thank you again for praying, all the nurses and doctors are impressed with how well she is doing! We know it is a testament to God's power at work in her. By the way, this picture is from last Saturday. Mia no longer has the IV in her left hand, just in case you were wondering.

Wednesday

Mia had another good day. She is now up to 32 cc's of milk every 3 hours...very close to our goal! She also had her bone scan today and we are still waiting to hear back on the results for that. We still haven't heard back from her CT scan yet. Otherwise her day has been rather mellow which is nice, she needs time to not be poked or bugged!

Tuesday

Mia is becoming a great little eater! She is now consuming 20 cc's every 3 hours and we found out today that the goal for her is 48 cc's every 3 hours, so she is almost halfway there.

Mia's PICC line also works. Now she doesn't need IV's so she won't be poked as much anymore...thank you God!

She also got her CT scan today. This is what the ear, nose and throat specialists want to make sure the only thing wrong is her partially blocked nasal passage. We should hear back tomorrow on the results of that and hopefully know more of what they want to do to fix her nasal passage.

She is officially on the books for her bone scan tomorrow morning. They'll run some type of fluid through her body between 8am and 10am and then several hours later they'll do the scan. If she has an infection, the fluid will bind to it and show up on the scan. Now I am sure these are not the technical words for it, but that is the picture I've received on how it works.

She also had an echocardiogram today. They do these occasionally to see how her heart is doing and hers looked fine.

In addition, the swelling in her left arm has gone down substantially. Because she had been through so much they asked one of the nurses trained in "baby massage" to give her one. And it was really cute to see her relax as the girl massaged her arms and legs. She was asleep after...it didn't take very long!

All in all we have much to be thankful for today. We can't say it enough...Praise God!

Monday

Today has been a long day for Mia and it is not over yet as I write this post. Her feeds have increased tremendously today. She is now at 16 cc's (about 1/2 ounce) every 3 hours. If you remember from before she was every 6 hours, but today Mia made the transition to every 3 hours and she has been doing just fine with that. Praise God!

Today they also tried to put a PICC line in Mia around 5pm with no success. In the process, one of her IV's came out and so they changed all of her other IV fluids to the other IV. I left at about 7pm when they normally kick me out because of shift change and when I came back at 8pm her left arm had swollen up because the IV wasn't working and the fluids were being pumped into her arm. So now she has no IV that is working. On duty tonight is the registered nurse who is very good at placing PICC lines, so when I left the hospital, she was in the process of trying to place a PICC line on Mia. She had gotten the line in, but it was not curling like she wanted it. So we continue to trust God regarding this situation. She still needs a line for her antibiotics.

We thought that she would get a bone scan today, however, that hasn't happened and so it may happen tomorrow. The good news is that the radiologist who was looking at Mia's xray isn't quite so sure anymore that she has a bone infection, however, they are still going to do a scan on her to make sure.

I look back on what has happened today and what is yet to come and I am reminded that things may look impossible for us, but for God anything is possible. He can easily allow the PICC line to be placed and he can make sure she doesn't have a bone infection. And so I pray for those things, but I also trust that He knows what is best for her and it might not be what I think is best. I'm just glad that He knows what is best.

Sunday

Praise God for Mia's continued success with eating. She is now up to 13 cc's every 6 hours!

The doctors told us that tomorrow they are going to do a bone scan on Mia to see if she has an infection. If that is positive in her pelvic region, then they are going to do a follow-up MRI to make sure it is an infection and not just excess fluid. The plan is to also put in a PICC line tomorrow. In addition, she's been having some "desats" ...that is when the oxygen rate in her blood lowers to a point they are not happy with. Because her right nasal passage is partially blocked, the doctors think it might have something to do with that...maybe she's not getting enough oxygen at all times. So they are planning on doing a CT scan on her nose/throat region sometime this week just to make sure there is nothing else wrong and to get a better understanding of her blocked nasal passage (is it bone that is blocking or is it membrane). They had been planning on doing this later on anyway, but now because of her desats they want to have it done sooner. They also want to make sure that her trachea is ok.

Thank you for continuing to pray. Lisa tells Brad that Mia uses her "big words" sometimes...ok, maybe she doesn't, but if she did, she would say thank you for remembering her in your prayers.

Saturday

Today was another good day for Mia. She has been doing really well with her feedings and she is now up to 10 cc's every 6 hours. She can even get a bit fussy before her feedings and after being fed she is content and ready to sleep. We asked the nurse how much she weighed and she said 7 pounds 12 ounces and we were in shock, but then she said "wait a second, that's the baby in the crib next to her...she's only 6 pounds 12 ounces." But that's great, she continues to put on more weight each day.

Tonight they may try to place the PICC line, so we continue to pray for God's will regarding this. And they are still debating on MRI or bone scan...the doctors are trying to figure out which would be the best option for her.

Friday

Today was a good day for Mia. They upped her feedings to 7 cc's every 6 hours and she even got to try bottle feeding for one of her feedings. She did really well with the bottle. They also placed another IV, but have still not decided on whether to try for another PICC line or a central line instead. They have not done a bone scan on her yet, instead they are going to do a MRI of her pelvic bone, but that probably won't happen until Monday.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We have much to be thankful for. Looking back at the last 8 weeks, God has had his hand on our family in ways that have been very apparent and some we don't even know. It is nice to know that we serve an awesome and mighty God who is very present in our lives at all times.

So, even though it was a long day for Mia, we know that God has been watching over her the entire time and knows what is best for her. The doctors tried for several hours to put a PICC line in her, but to no avail. As a result, they might have to put in another central line instead. If they put in the central line, it will require another surgery. It is a little more invasive than a PICC line, however there are advantages to having a central line. As we continue to wait and see what the doctors decide, our prayers would be that she receives what is best for her.

As Thanksgiving comes to an end, we are grateful for all of you who continue to encourage, support, and pray for Mia. May God bless you all as you so richly bless us.

Wednesday

Mia's feeds stopped last night because the doctors were not happy with the color of her residual (the stuff left in her stomach after a feed). As a result, they did an xray on her abdomen. Everything looked fine, but they noticed a possible inflammation of her pelvic bone. The doctors believe she might have an infection of the bone. On Friday they are going to run a bone scan to verify for sure. The good news is that if it is an infection, the antibiotics she is on right now will be the ones they continue to use for the bone infection, the bad news is she'll have to have them for about 6 weeks.

On a positive note though, they started her on her feeds again today and she has been processing them just fine. We believe that her feeds stopped last night because God needed the doctors to do an xray of her abdomen area to notice the pelvic bone. We continue to trust in His care over the situation.

Tomorrow they want to put a PICC line in Mia. It is similar to the central line she had that got infected, but it goes through a vein in one of her hands or feet. The nurses have a hard time getting IV's in Mia, so pray that the doctors will be successful with the PICC line.

Tuesday

Today was a great day for Mia. She got 3 cc's of milk at 11am and digested it just fine! So they gave her another 3 cc's of milk at 5pm. She'll get another 3 cc's at 11pm if she is able to digest the 5pm milk. You may be asking, how much is 3 cc's? It is probably close to the amount of a pen cap filled with liquid. It is a very little bit, but as she continues to digest she'll continue to get more milk. It also looks as though her infection is almost cleared. And she's even putting on more weight. As of tonight, she weighs 6 pounds 8 ounces!

Monday

Mia still continues to work on getting rid of her infection. Today she got fed breast milk again for the first time since last Thursday. She got 3 cc's of milk, but only processed 1 cc of it, so they are waiting to feed her anymore until tomorrow. She has had alot more awake time recently and it is nice to see her big blue eyes.

Giving Thanks

I have to warn you, staring at my daughter, Mia, may cause you to forget what you were doing, that you have other commitments, that you require food and sleep. She is that CUTE! Thank you for everything you have said, done, prayed for, and given to us. We have so, so much to be thankful for! Little Mia had an infection since last Thursday night. (Nov 15th). But the antibiotics have given her fever the boot, and tonight (Nov 18th) they removed her broviac central line from her chest. The doctors are pretty sure the broviac was the source of the infection and it had to go. Also, they were unable to draw blood from it, so it had outlived its usefulness. In the future, they are going to replace the central line, to feed Mia and give fluids and draw blood from. I am still hopeful that Mia can come home to Bakersfield for Christmas. God is so good to us. Have a very happy Thanksgiving and hug and kiss your families for us!