January 1999, wearing a shirt that we bought at the dairy booth at the State Fair last fall.

3/13/99:Why is this baby smiling? Because she's learned how to sleep through the night! This was taken with a digital camera that I borrowed over the weekend. Many many more pictures to follow! (possibly movies, too, for you high-bandwidth people)

12/16/98:Wednesday, on mommy's shoulder at the Guthrie annual Christmas lunch!

12/16/98:Wednesday (same day as the main picture above). Suzanna charmed the pants offa the people at the Guthrie Theatre during the annual Christmas lunch!

12/16/98: Wednesday. This was a sad day for Suzanna (after the Guthrie party). She got FOUR SHOTS, and Daddy almost freaked out! She recovered her composure more quickly than daddy did, however.

12/11/98:Friday.
Tina, Aunt Shirley and Suzanna enjoy a lunch together with Auntie Bug (Helen, Shirley's sister).

November sometime:
In Mommy's arms, getting ready to go for a walk!

11/7/98: Saturday. The MRI came back completely normal, as well as the super-duper hearing test they gave her. She's eating more and more. She's been off "the tube" for over 24 hours and continues to put on weight. The nurses want to send her home, but they need to convince the (understandably cautious) doctors. Tonight, we'll probably take her upstairs with us for a night of practice (nice to have some backup nearby). Then, if all goes well, she may come home with us on Sunday! Dang, gotta go to Babies R Us and get some stuff!

11/5/98: Thursday. Okay, here's what's been going on lately. Tuesday night, we started boarding at the hospital, so that whenever Suzie wakes up and asks to be fed, mom can come down and feed her. I'm staying over, too, just to make the room seem more "homey". (We have a double-bed, but whoo! Plastic matress!) Suzanna isn't making GREAT progress on breastfeeding. But we started her on a bottle yesterday, and she gets a LOT more milk that way. So, we start with Mommy, and when Suzie gets bored or tired, we give her the rest with a bottle.

Tuesday night, she gave us quite a scare -- the night nurse reported that she went into a brief period of rapid eye-blinking, followed by a period of just staring straight ahead and not paying attention to anything. Her skin color was mottled, like it gets when she's chilled. It looked like a form of siezure, which is something they've been concerned about due to her stressful birth. They ran another EEG on her on Wednesday morning, and everything looked completely normal. To be completely on the safe side, however, they're going to run an MRI on her brain today. I'm going to go with her -- she gets to ride in an ambulance over to the East Bank Campus of the University Hospitals. That's where the MRI scanner is, along with an expert on baby brains. So, we'll see. Since she'll need to be sedated for the (completely noninvasive) process, mommy won't be needed for feedings for a while. I've told TG to go home, take a nap, eat some food, take a shower.

Several nurses report that they agree with our suspicions -- Suzanna is already smiling on purpose! She's a darling!

11/2/98: Monday. Suzanna is stable enough that they've decided to remove the heart and respiration monitor electrodes. Today, we're trying a little "on-demand" feeding; seeing whether she'll eat more if she's allowed to get a little hungry. Early indications are that it's not working as well as we might like -- but we have time, and there are other things we can try. She looks so good these days, it's hard to remember that just a short while ago she was a VERY sick little girl!

10/31/98: Saturday. "Feeding instruction" continues. A BIG 14cc in the morning, followed by 8cc at noon, followed by....zero (maybe two) at 3:00. Exhausted mom & dad take some time off and go home. We're told that she was really feisty at yesterday's 9:00pm feeding, so we'll go back and try her then. The nurses all think she's a real darling!

10/30/98: Friday. Suzanna is becoming more alert and aware of her surroundings each day. She's been moved to "Nursery #5", which is a quieter room filled with babies who tend to be doing better and are closer to going home.

The one thing she has yet to learn is how to feed herself adequately. To be released from the hospital, she has to nurse properly and demonstrate a "consistent weight gain". A "full feeding" for her is about 60 ccs of mother's milk. This week, she started out getting 2 cc's on her own. Yesterday, she was up to 10 cc's. But it varies with each feeding (ZERO this morning, although mom can tell you that she clamped down pretty hard!). As one who has used the old "little finger as pacifier" trick, I can assure you that she can suck VERY WELL if she puts her mind to it.

So..release date? Can't say. Let's all hope for next week sometime.

10/29/98: Thursday. Suzanna is 900 grams heavier than she was at birth, and is up to 6 cc's of feeding herself at each go. A "full feeding" is 65 cc's, so there's our marker. We're told that she has to demonstrate the ability to feed herself, and show a consistent weight gain in order to be "green-lighted" to go home. She's becoming more alert, however, looking around the room and giving everyone those goo-goo eyes. She charmed the socks offa the lactation consultant this morning!

10/28/98: Wednesday. Suzanna is now officially a week old! She has no more tubes in her body (just a couple wires coming out to tell us how she's doing -- heartrate, blood oxygenation, and respiration). Well, okay, one tube: she hasn't quite figured out how to feed herself. She takes a stab at it, but more often than not, drifts off to sleep in the middle. Still a very snoozy baby! The nurses have been feeding her mother's milk at regular intervals via a slender tube snaking down into her stomach. We're thinking that Suzie may take a more active interest in eating for herself once that becomes the only way to get food. She gets a little better at it every day, so we'll just keep trying.

Because there had been concern about possible brain damage during her traumatic birth, Suzanna had another EEG run yesterday morning. TG tells me that the official word is that it's "normal."

She's becoming more alert, opening her eyes and looking around more. They're a deep, deep blue. Her hair, now that it's gotten a good washing, is a fine, light brown. It seems to be getting redder as days go by -- don't know if that's because it's getting bleached by light, or just getting cleaner!

Sorry I don't have any more recent pictures -- I'll try to kill off a roll by the weekend, so you can see what her face looks like without medical tape and tubes all over it.

10/24/98:
Saturday. We spent most of the day holding her. She's down to just a couple tubes, sleeping in a regular crib now with blankets wrapped around her. Still a little groggy from the Fentanyl (a narcotic) that she had in her, but acting more and more like a little baby all the time.

what a cutie.

10/22/98:
TG spent her second day at the hospital. In the morning, she went in to see li'l Suzanna, who just continues to improve. She spent an hour in the rocking chair holding her and humming to her. Suzanna's blood pressure goes up when she's held (this is a good thing; it's been a little low), and that's a good sign that she knows her mommy!

10/20/98:
Here she is in the NICU, only a few hours old. She had a difficult birth (breathed a lot of meconium), and she'll be here for a while until she gets clean. Daddy finally got some food after 18+ hours, so he's doing better than he was. At this point, mom was still in bed, so she couldn't be in the picture.

Here's TG and Suzanna meeting for the first time. Both of them are a little the worse for wear (check out the shape of Suzanna's head!), but you can see how happy TG is!