Happy 18 weeks to Hadassah, Isabella and Cianna!
"You're just too good to be true.
Can't take my eyes off of you.
You'd be like heaven to touch.
I wanna hold you so much.
At long last love has arrived.
And I thank God I'm alive.
You're just too good to be true.
Can't take my eyes off of you.
Pardon the way that I stare.
There's nothing else to compare.
The sight of you leaves me weak.
There are no words left to speak.
But if you feel like I feel.
Please let me know that it's real.
You're just too good to be true.
Can't take my eyes off of you."
- Lauren Hill - Can't Take My Eyes Off of You
Words can't describe how much I love our girls! I sit holding them for hours trying to memorize every aspect of them. Every smile makes my heart skip a beat. Every cry and whimper makes my heart crush to pieces. I give them thousands of hugs and kisses. I sing to them. I read the bible to them. I breathe for them. I can't believe they are here. I can't believe they are mine (well they're God's but he's letting me believe they are mine). I feel so blessed to have them. After so many years, I never though this day would come. I never thought I would feel this love or happiness! I'm so thankful to God for allowing me to be blessed with these three beautiful girls! And I'm so thankful to each and every one of you, for your words of encouragement, for your prayers and your love.
VISITATIONS
Well the girls are all gearing to come home over the next few weeks. I know that you are all eager to come and see the girls. We feel the same way, however, the girls are preemies. The flu and rsv season are not over and therefore we are restricting visits at this time to FAMILY only. If you have been sick or near others sick within 24 hours of visiting the girls please stay home. We just can't risk anything right now. I have a few engagements this month of April and I will be seen out and about with Hadassah (at the least)... I am restricting people holding her and touching her, especially children. Please do not take offense. I know you are all excited. But April will come and go and so will the flu/rsv season and then come late April/early May we will open visits to all our family and friends. Thank you in advance for your understanding!
CIANNA
Cianna is doing great! The fear of NEC has subsided and she is currently on full milk feeds! She is getting about 45cc of milk every 3 hours. The Speech Therapy nurse comes and sits with Cianna for about an hour every morning. She offers Cianna a bottle and monitors to see how Cianna handles drinking, sucking, swallowing, and breathing. She tends to forget to breathe and sometimes has a dip in heart rate. She started taking 5cc, then 10cc and now she is up to 25cc. Speech Therapy is confident that by the end of this week Cianna will be able to take the bottle regularly without the supervision of the nurse which means that I can offer her the bottle myself. Cianna is currently just a feeder and grower. The Doctors believe that it will take her a long time to full take all of her 8 bottles a day therefore this upcoming Sunday, Tito and I will be going to CHOP for a NG-tube placement class. They will be teaching us how to insert Cianna's feeding tube as they believe that she will be home soon but will require the feeding tube when she doesn't take all of her bottle. I'm super nervous but I know that we can do it. I would much rather have her at home then in the hospital. She is also on 100% oxygen. She can come home on this and may require the oxygen anywhere between days to a year. But she'll be home! CHOP is very eager to train us and they hope to have Cianna home in April sometime. Ciann's attitude hasn't changed much in the past week. She is so cranky when she's awake and so peaceful when she finally falls asleep. Lord help us! LOL... Here are a few picture we captured of Cianna this week.
ISABELLA
Isabella had an interesting week. She wasn't taking all of her bottles at Virtua. Often times she would sweat and cry and would refuse the bottle (so the nurses said). So they transferred her to CHOP on Friday. She did very well with the transport. Speech Therapy met with her as soon as she got there and they didn't find anything wrong with her bottle feeds. Now a week later she is taking all of her 8 bottles and should be home next week! She is on 100% oxygen and will be coming home on the oxygen but I don't mind because she'll be home with me. Bella is growing slowly but growing none the less. She finally hit 7 pounds over this weekend. She is so darn cute when she isn't crying bloody murder for her binky! Praise the Lord for the creation of wubanubs (the pacifier with a beanie baby attached to help keep it in place). It has become our life-saver! And I bought a few just in case one goes missing LOL ... Here is Bella from this week...
HADASSAH
Hadassah has had a great week. She was supposed to come home last Friday but she continued to have brady's at least once every 16-24 hours. Virtua hopes to have her home by the end of this week. God willing she comes home this week. We can't wait to have her home. She is taking all of her bottles! She is drinking a little over 3 ounces every 3-4 hours! Such a piggy! She often passes out right after her bottle and gets lazy to burp! And over the past week she has left mommy some of the worst smelling surprises in her diaper! It should be illegal for baby poop to smell so bad! And this week I had my first experience of having to undress her, and basically giver her a mid day bath after her poop reached her neck! OMG! It was horrible! Anyway, enough about that! She is growing so fast! She hit 8 pounds this week. I look at her and I fear the thought of having to push a baby out that size! I was 8pounds and 9 ounces at birth - You go mom! Wow! I can't even imagine! Other than that she had a great week and here are some pictures to prove it...
Weights
Hadassah is now 8lb 2.2ozs (Getting ready to wear size 0-3)
Isabella is now 7lbs even (Currently wearing size Newborn)
Cianna is now 5lbs 9ozs (Is still in Preemie!)
Me - Well I need to lose weight! Like 25-30 pounds of weight! So I have downloaded MY FITNESS PAL to my ipad! It helped me before and I know it can help me now. I have tried to work out at home but due to muscle separation I feel like a bouncing hippo that is completely out of breath after 10 seconds of running in place -_- ... I know it's going to take time. I know that I'm going to have to work hard to get to where I want to be. But just thinking about it makes me want to sit on the couch with a Twinkie. I went out to the stores yesterday with Tito. I took about 10 tops and 3 jeans into the fitting room. After trying the three jeans and about half of the shirts I ran out of the fitting room giving up. I felt horrible! I hate the way things fit. I get that you have to love your body, yeah I had triplets but you can't use that as an excuse. I have never had weight issues before. I just want jeans to fit right around my waist, butt and thighs without having a muffin top. I want shirts too look smooth and well fitted around my mom-boobs, waist and stomach. So I'm going to have to give up some things. I'm going to have to work out. But most importantly I need to establish a healthy eating plan that I can continue even after I have lost the weight I need to lose. What good is it to lose weight and then gain it again when your eating habits aren't healthy? Come on now! So I really need winter to give up and surrender to Spring so that I can head out to the track and burn some calories. And I need to find my Zumba workout disc, sooner rather then later... *sigh*
Me - Well I need to lose weight! Like 25-30 pounds of weight! So I have downloaded MY FITNESS PAL to my ipad! It helped me before and I know it can help me now. I have tried to work out at home but due to muscle separation I feel like a bouncing hippo that is completely out of breath after 10 seconds of running in place -_- ... I know it's going to take time. I know that I'm going to have to work hard to get to where I want to be. But just thinking about it makes me want to sit on the couch with a Twinkie. I went out to the stores yesterday with Tito. I took about 10 tops and 3 jeans into the fitting room. After trying the three jeans and about half of the shirts I ran out of the fitting room giving up. I felt horrible! I hate the way things fit. I get that you have to love your body, yeah I had triplets but you can't use that as an excuse. I have never had weight issues before. I just want jeans to fit right around my waist, butt and thighs without having a muffin top. I want shirts too look smooth and well fitted around my mom-boobs, waist and stomach. So I'm going to have to give up some things. I'm going to have to work out. But most importantly I need to establish a healthy eating plan that I can continue even after I have lost the weight I need to lose. What good is it to lose weight and then gain it again when your eating habits aren't healthy? Come on now! So I really need winter to give up and surrender to Spring so that I can head out to the track and burn some calories. And I need to find my Zumba workout disc, sooner rather then later... *sigh*
Pumping... Formula... etc.
I have decided to no longer pump. I'm very proud of making it to 4 months but it was taking a toll on me and I just couldn't keep up. I'm happy to have gotten the girls out of the "danger" zone in the Nicu. It's been about 3 weeks since the last time I pumped and I'm ok with it. It did take a while to convince myself that I was ok with this decision. I know the benefits of breastmilk and how much the girls really needed it so it was hard to part with the pump. But the girls are doing great now and are managing formula very well. They have been placed on Gerber Good Start Nourish - for premature babies. It is currently only sold at Wallgreens and Babies R'Us which is a great pain in the butt. I reached out to my local Wal-Mart and ShopRite and I asked them if it was possible to special order me the formula in bulk every month considering that I'll need about 30 cans a month. I'm now waiting to here back from them. The Nicu at Virtua is being kind enough to send Hadassah home with at least a 2 week supply, plus they're giving me a TON of coupons and thankfully have reached out to Gerber who will be sending me a few cases for each girl!!! Praise God! He never fails us and is always on time!
Nursery
It's crunch time! And I haven't done much! LOL .... Tito finally put up the shelves and initials on the wall. They came out so cute and the colors look great against the lime green walls. Special thank you to my cousin Veronica who took the time to help me buy and paint the letters. We had fun that night. Special thanks to a good friend Venus who got the girls their very first teddy bears and brought them to the girls the day after they were born. They fit perfectly on the shelves! We love them and we know that the girls will too! Special thanks to my cousins Ricky and Jocie for the Peace, Love & Smile owl decorations! They are absolutely perfect!!!!! I have been dying to use them since you guys gave them to me at my baby shower! Thank you so much for them! So... I washed a lot of clothes this week and now it's time to sort everything out and put things away. And I need to get a rocking chair!
All in All
All in all it's been a great week and I'm looking forward to this following week. My sister in law comes in from San Francisco on Saturday. She's coming to help out with the girls and I'm looking forward to spending some time with her. We are having guest from Puerto Rico over this weekend for Massai Millville's third weekend of Kingdom Builders (conference). This weekend it's a three day conference (Fri, Sat, & Sunday). The past two weekends have been great and I'm looking forward to seeing what God has in store for this upcoming weekend. If you want more information or would like to visit don't hesitate contacting me. Oh and God willing Hadassah will be home! So we have a lot going on but so much to look forward to and I can't wait!
Till next time... Xoxo
Jackie
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