The Williams Twins: LOTS of weekend updates!

Well I spent the weekend once again in Webster with my boys so I haven’t updated in several days because I didn’t take my computer plus I was on the verge of deleting the blog altogether but decided against it. If you feel like what I say is offensive, inappropriate, or just to your disliking then don’t follow up on how the boys and I are doing. Speaking of which, Jason and Reece are doing GREAT! This weekend I had hoped for Reece to get his feeding tube out and for both boys to be on all bottle feeds before the weekend was over and sure enough on Friday that was in the orders from the doctor. Once again God answered our prayers!

As of Friday J & R were both getting all 8 feeds by bottle which means their little feeding tubes in their noses came out! This was exciting and I know my boys were very ready for the tape to be off their sweet little faces and to be tube free. On Friday they had visits from my Meme and PawPaw (their great grandparents on my side of the family)! The boys are lucky to have so many grandparents on both mine and Ryan’s side. It’s hard to imagine they have already meet 5 grandma/nana/great grandmas/granny/meme’s and 3 papa/grandpa’s and still have 2 more PawPaw’s to go! (Ok that might have been confusing…) Anyways the boys were as sweet as could be while Meme and PawPaw visited. They took lots of pictures and held the little bundles for a while.

On Saturday I meet my parents at the hospital at 8:00 am to drop of milk. They visited with the boys while Ryan and I “slept in” for the morning. At 9:30 we joined them and the nurse had Ryan and I give Jason & Reece a bath and then we spent the day with once Mom and Dad left. The boys were so darn cute during their bath and it felt good to have them both off the monitors. I have grown use to their small size and toss them around like footballs. During bath time they cried a little but they don’t cry like the other babies do. They fuss, but hardly ever let out a good scream. The nurses tell us that with time they will cry more and sleep less and not always be the “perfect” little babies they are.

On Saturday we got news from the doctor that Reece has a murmur in his heart. The cardiologist came by and checked it all out and said it’s PDA. It’s fairly common among preemies but typically the doctor said it’s treated right after birth and that the medicines given will help it to close. Basically to put it into simple terms it’s a vein that is suppose to close when the babies are born. Prior to birth the vein helps circulate blood from the mothers uterus to the baby (and passes either through or by the lungs). Anyways long story short the cardio doctor said they would start him on medicines, but by that afternoon the doctor in the NICU said the medicines wouldn’t be used because the PDA is not effecting Reece’s vital signs and appears to be functioning fine with the PDA. If that changes, which they don’t suspect it will they will try the medicine, but it could result in a surgery in order for it to be fixed.

In addition to surgeries I have mentioned before about Reece’s penis. He has what is called hypostasis. 1 in 250 babies have this disorder and while that doesn’t sound like a lot it seems as though the doctors and nurses see it a lot. Plus I have found the loop hole for beating all odds so why not another one? Due to the hypostasis Reece will not be circumcised when Jason is and will have to have correctional surgery when he is later. There isn’t a set time for having it done. Basically depending on how it develops, how Reece grows and his age will depend on when it can be corrected.

As for Jason he doesn’t keep things as exciting as Reece. He is doing really good though! He went from all 8 bottles a day taking 50 cc’s on Friday to 56 on Saturday and as of today he is now able to eat as much as he wants every 3 hours. In all honesty he was really already doing this yesterday because I was able to start breast feeding with him. He latched on without any problem. During the first feed he sucked for about 25 minutes and then downed 45 cc’s of formula. During the second feed he sucked and had an addition 1 ½ ounces of formula. At both last night and today’s feedings he didn’t want any additional supplements by bottle and the breast milk alone seemed to fill him up.

Everyone wants to know about them coming home. I am still thinking Jason will come home this week hopefully. Jason got his Hep B shot today and once he proves to be holding his own temperature which he pretty much already is then he will be moved to an open crib. After the open crib or during the same time frame they will do the car seat challenge, hearing test, and circumcision about 2-3 days prior to discharge. As for Reece he won’t leave before he gets his HepB shot. That shot can’t be given to a baby till the baby weighs at least 4lb…then he has to do the other stuff as well. As of today Reece was 3lbs 5oz and Jason was 5lbs 10oz. They are getting there little by little, day by day!

Since Jason is breast feeding I am pumping for Reece tonight and then going down in the morning to bathe the boys before their feed at 11. Another 12 hour+ day of driving/being at the hospital! I will be SO GLAD when they are BOTH FINALLY home! Here are some pictures from the weekend...enjoy and have a great week!

Mommy giving Reece a bath!