NICU Day 8 (December 15th)

Today at 11:27AM, we celebrated one week of life outside the womb with our little Noelle!! I cannot believe we are at this day already--it still seems like yesterday that all the drama was going down, and they were delivering our baby girl. God's amazing grace has been so evident as we look back on that day--the timing of the details could not have been orchestrated by anyone other than Him. Noelle had another good day today and is still stable. The doctors discovered that she has hyperthyroidism and have started her on the medications for that, so hopefully that will help the blood sugar fluctuation and weight gain especially. It is not certain whether she had this in the womb and thus it contributed to her small size or if it's something she has since developed. Some preemies develop this as a "transient" thing and grow out of it. The geneticist also called today and said the fast results on Noelle's blood came back normal concerning her chromosomes...just like the amniocentesis. The full results won't be ready until the new year, but it was yet another encouraging sign that nothing is glaringly wrong. So, another day down. We are thoroughly enjoying our precious bundle--she is becoming more alert at times and is very responsive to our voices and touch. Thank you for caring enough to read these updates and keep up with our small family. Your expressions of love, your kind comments and thoughts and especially your prayers are appreciated from the bottom of our hearts. We wish we could communicate back to each one of you!! Thank you.

NICU Day 7 (December 14th)

In the doctor's own words this morning, "Noelle is stable, and she is having a good day!!" We were so thankful to hear those words today and have an "easy" day in the NICU. Her blood sugar is still fluctuating more than they would like, but they are attributing it to her size and the fact that she is still trying to get rid of fluids from the birth. She had to have another blood transfusion this morning since her hemoglobin dropped a little low but she tolerated it well. Unfortunately, one of the lines into her through the umbilical cord has a clot in it, so they had to put a hep lock into her foot so they can give her transfusions and other IV fluids through there. They were able to turn the bili light off today as her jaundice level was good. That could go back and forth for a while, but it was fun to see her without her glasses today. She had another echocardiogram as well which came back good. She finally had a messy diaper today, so hopefully her x-ray tomorrow will show all the air out of her intestines, and she can start on her feeds again. She will be one week tomorrow, and we are praising God that we are reaching another small milestone at that point. Continuing one day at a time...thank you for your love and prayers!!!

NICU Day 4 (December 11th)

  ***Written by Chris McDowell, Jill's Mother***

Noelle has had another "good" day. Her oxygen levels were stable. Her blood sugar has fluctuated quite a bit today. She also needed another transfusion of blood this morning. They had to give her fentanyl to sedate her a bit because she is fighting against the ventilator, trying to breath on her own and she is definitely not ready. They were able to start feeding her through a tube in her mouth. They are feeding her colostrum on a slow drip. She has tolerated it well so far. Jill was discharged today, but they had them stay in the hospital one more night. Tomorrow they will start working on their daily schedule of Jill being at the hospital early in the mornings for grand rounds to get the Doctors' updates and such, then go home for a while and then after Tom gets off work, go back to the hospital for a few hours. Jill is not in any shape to drive yet so she will have help. My sister is going to be there for several days this week.
We can't thank you all enough for your continued prayers and support as there are still many hurdles ahead.
God Bless You ALL.