Today went pretty well for the most part. Landon continued to eat good quantities, although we're still working on that breastfeeding thing. We'll get there, he's just determined to take baby steps for now, which is ok. As long as he's eating well, we're not picky about where the food is coming from. I (Allison) have continued to make progress in the pumping department (which is more than some of you may want to know) but it can feel like one step forward, two steps back at times. Again, baby steps, this seems to be a theme for now.
Landon's SATs (oxygen saturation levels) have been pretty good for the most part this week but had a significant desat on Wednesday, which is why the pediatric cardiologist wanted him staying until tomorrow. Most "normal" babies have SATs of 92-100, and Landon has been mostly in the 80s all week. The cardiologist said he is happy with 80s or even upper occasional uppers 70s as long as they aren't sustained.
After feeding him "dinner" tonight and leaving him sleeping like a rock, Gary, my mom and I went down to get some food for ourselves. By the time we got back, the nurse on duty, Becky, was kind of messing with him and he seemed fussy. She said that his SATs had been in the low 70s for a while during his sleep (when his SATs should be relatively stable) and even dropped down into the upper 50s at one point. She put him on some oxygen to help him maintain his SATs and that helped mostly but he even dropped into the 60s once on oxygen while sleeping. He clearly is agitated by the oxygen tubes (I think I would be agitated by tubes shoved up my nose too) and that doesn't help him sleep or his sats. His SATs are greatly affected by him being upset, etc so the tubes help by giving him oxyen but keep him from sleeping very well.
It was a little bit of a shock to Gary and I to see him on oxygen since he hasn't needed it all week and his SATs have been at good levels for the most part. Becky (the nurse) said that it meant we would have to take home an oxygen tank, but I think we're not banking on going home tomorrow at this point. It would be great and we would love it, but with some of he major desats he's had today, we'll have to wait and talk to the pediatric cardiologist tomorrow about everything.
Please pray that Landon will be able to get some good sleep through the night even with the oxygen tubes. When he doesn't sleep well, then he doesn't have the energy to eat and we start this whole cycle over again (the feeding quota and the threat of a feeding tube.) We've talked about one of us staying with him through the night tonight to make sure he's doing ok and to be here to comfort him but not sure what we'll do yet. It's not the easiest place to sleep with all the monitors and alarms and babies crying but we also want him to be comforted.
Probably tmi but... One thing that helped me when pumping was to take an old bra and cut circles out of the center of the cups (in line with nipple placement) and use it while pumping as a hands free thingie! Then reading posts on breastfeeding.com or others like that... Weird but true. I got more milk that way... And still do a almost a year later!
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