No July 4th babies....

Well, Joy is a real trooper and followed the doctors orders to stay pregnant over the weekend. As usual I spent my weekend hanging out in the room with Joy. I think we have now seen all of the Star Wars flicks at least once and at times maybe even twice. You'd think that was the only program Spike TV was allowed to air.

We've also found that there really isn't any reason to waste money on cable. We spend most of our time flipping through junky reality shows, old movies we could watch on Netflix, and reruns from the major networks. Yup, I'm glad I've been pocketing that $50+ a month for the past 5 years (which adds up to approx. $3,000).

We had quite a bit of company this weekend and overall it seemed to pass by pretty quickly. Monday was a bit of a bummer because they put off the fireworks until Tuesday. We are hoping to see them from the 9th floor windows. This just gives us something to look forward to tonight.

Sunday, July 3rd, Joy's IV came out and you'd think she had won the lottery. She was so excited to get that out. I was pretty happy for her too. It was probably the most exciting thing to have happened over the past several weeks. Just taking it out also seemed to perk her up a bit. Funny how something so small can really change a person's mental state.

Sunday the babies had a few decels. Each time they occurred just moments before they took her off of the NST. Since the nurses don't have a computer screen in the room on the 7th floor, they didn't know until they re-reviewed the strip. This lead to them having to hook Joy back up for another 30 minutes. No big deal and everything looked good.

After Joy's NST on July 3rd, the nurse came in a little while later and warned Joy that she was not going to be happy with her. Joy cringed, started to sweat and panic. She was thinking "Oh know the IV has to go back in." The nurse said I need to hook you up for another 30 minutes on the NST and Joy went "Oh that's it? OK".

I can't believe it just 6 more days now! Then we get to see our little ones and the NICU phase starts. Let's hope for an uneventful NICU stay. I'm also crossing my fingers that they come home in 4-5 weeks after delivery. That seems to be a common range for 32 week old premies. This would be good too since Joy would have a month to recover then a month with the girls before going back to work.

It is amazing to look at a chart we were given several months ago in the 30-32 week range. The stats look very good now. The only stat that changes for a 33-34 week old is the CLD stat dropping to 1%.

98% chance of survival
7% CLD (Chronic Lung Disease from the ventilators and being on oxygen for so long)
1% NEC Necrotizing Enterocolitis (Parts of their bowels can become infected a die due to not being ready for milk)
NA for PDA (the valve not sealing to create a separation of the 4 heart chambers. This generally happens with the babies first cry).
1% IVH (level 3/4) These are severe brain bleeds that can lead to Cerebral Paulsey and other behavioral disorders.
0% ROP (This is a Retinopathy of Prematurity can lead to blindness)

For comparison the stats at 26 weeks when Joy went it were..
84% survival
34% morbidity (Severe IVH,CLD,NEC, infections ROP)
44% CLD

9% NEC
48%PDA
9% IVH
5% ROP

So things are looking pretty good.