Cutie!

We Found some Mistletoe!

Our Little Stocking Stuffer!

Feliz Navidad!

A White Christmas for the White Baby!

Believe it or not, Santa found Kellan in the hospital and delivered gifts to him! He was too sneaky for pictures, but sure did leave goodies!
Kellan has has a good couple of days. He's off oxygen, except for feedings. He's doing great!
Tonight he weighed 5 pounds 9 ounces. And today we are bottle feeding three times, breast feeding four times, and one tube feeding. Slow and steady progress is all we can ask for! This may not have been the way we envisioned the first Christmas with our son, but it has turned out to be a special day for the three of us!
Merry Christmas from Ty, Amber, and Kellan White!

Just Hanging Out!

Just Riding the Rollercoaster

Kellan underwent an upper GI and dysphasiagram. The upper GI showed what Ty and I knew. Kellan has severe reflux. The dysphasiagram showed that when he refluxes it does not go into his airway or his lungs. His suck/swallow mechanism is strong. So now we are cutting back on breast feeding to three times per day. He has three bottles of breast milk thickened with rice cereal. And we are tube feeding twice per day. Complicated, right?? At this point whatever works is fine!
Kellan now weighs 5 pounds 6 ounces. He's still on oxygen, but we changed to a regular nasal canula. He's on .8 liters at 21%, which is room air (you and I are breathing 21% oxygen now). I think we are slowly moving back up from our dip down!
We were given this advice from a good friend. "It'll be a long time before you come of this roller coaster, so Ty and I need to share some cotton candy and a funnel cake and enjoy the ride!"

Biggest Disappointment EVER

So, it's been a while since we've posted. We were hoping our next post would be of Kellan in his bed at home. On Saturday the doctor thought Kellan was doing well enough to room in on Sunday night, meaning Ty and I would take care of him in a room on our own. If he did well Sunday night, then he could be discharged Monday. We checked into a room in the hospital Saturday night, planning to room in Sunday. Then it all started falling apart. At 1:30 Sunday morning, Kellan wouldn't take his bottle. They stopped and tube fed the rest. Sunday morning Kellan acted fussy like he was in pain. As the day went on this got worse and worse. He required oxygen again. He screamed after each feeding. He was refluxing. Finally, they started him on Zantac. The medication takes several doses before it is really effective. Kellan is still refluxing after some feedings. It is so hard to watch your child hurt and not be able to fix it. Today we are having tests run to see how bad the reflux is. We keep hoping that once this gets figured out he won't need oxygen. With this huge setback it looks unlikely that Kellan will be home for Christmas. We are so disappointed. We want him to be well, but we know that he will do much better at home.

Kellan Lightyear to the rescue!

Today was a great day! Kellan had a major weight gain all the way up to 5 pounds 2 ounces! We finally broke the 5 pound barrier! We also switched forms of oxygen delivery, from the nasal canula to the oxihood. Ty says the oxihood looks like a space helmet just like a baby Buzz Lightyear. Kellan seems much happier and that's all that matters!

Finally...An Update!

It's been a while since our last update! I went back to work yesterday for the first time in six weeks. It was really hard to leave Kellan, even though I work in the same hospital, on the same floor! I really miss spending the day snuggling with my baby!
Kellan has had a good few days. Tonight he weighed 4 pounds 15 ounces! Five pounds here we come!! We moved back up to breast feeding five times a day, if he's up for it.
The BIG change today is...Kellan is off oxygen! They stopped it at about 2:00 today. He's pretty congested, so we really hope he's able to stay off it. We are so proud of our little boy! As long as he stays off oxygen, the only thing we need to work on is breast feeding. We are getting so close to going home!

A Small Step Back

Kellan lost weight Wednesday and Thursday night. We weren't sure why, so we cut back the number of breast feedings per day to four. This will probably delay Kellan's discharge.
Now Kellan receives two bottles during the night, four breast feedings during the day, and two tube feedings. It seems like he needed the rest because he gained almost two ounces last night. He weighs 4 pounds 11 ounces.
The doctor also stopped Kellan's caffeine three days ago. As long as his heart rate doesn't drop below 100 too often, we won't have to go home on caffeine. If his heart rate does drop frequently, then we will go home with an apnea monitor too. We are hoping we won't need either!!
Kellan is still on oxygen. He is on one liter at 30%. There is a chance he may go home on oxygen and slowly be weaned off.
When Santa visited Kellan yesterday, he told him all he wanted was to go home for Christmas! That's our hope!

Special Visitors!

Busy Days!

Kellan continues to do well! Yesterday he received another blood transfusion. Hopefully his last! He seems to be feeling much better today. His color is better and his heart rate is lower.
He is still breast feeding 4-5 times a day.
He had a follow up eye exam this morning. Good news! His blood vessels are completely grown out. He does not have any problems with his eyes! We have to follow up in two weeks.
The best news of all was....the doctor said we may get to go home in 7-10 days! Of course this can change, but we are so excited we can't stand it!! Keep praying that things continue to move in the right direction. We still have several hurdles!

Love this picture of our Kellan burrito! They had to put his IV in his scalp, but it's out today!

Santa's little helper!

Tonight Kellan weighed 4 lbs and 12 ounces, back up to our previous highest weight. He was 17 inches long, up a 1/4" from last week and his head was 1 cm bigger around at 32 cm! We also got to move to a normal oxygen line instead of the "high flow" machine he has been on for so long. We are making progress! Amber dressed him up like an elf, and he is off to the north pole to make toys as soon as he gets out of the nicu! Just kidding, we can't wait to get him home, hopefully in time for Santa to visit him.

Baby Booty!

Brrrr!

Hi!

Family

What a Crappy Situation

Kellan had a busy day with breast feeding five times again and bath day. But he had one more very important project. He hadn't pooped in a week. It was passed time. The doctor gave him a suppository to help. The nurse gave it and let me start feeding him. Kellan went right to work on his "project." He was pretty sleepy afterwards, so his nurse thought changing him would wake him up. So she did. Well, Kellan wasn't quite finished, so she got a new diaper. Then, it happened...his "project" totally covered the nurse's arm! She started gagging and I was laughing so hard I was crying! And Kellan? Well, he fell asleep! Sorry Nicole! I guess a baby's gotta do what a baby's gotta do! Needless to say, Kellan had a weight loss. Maybe tomorrow will be less explosive!
Other titles considered for this post:
Poop! There it Is
Poops, I Did It Again
Oh, Poopy Night
Sir Poops-a-lot
The Green Mile

More Baby Steps

Today I was able to breast feed Kellan five times! It was so exciting! He did great. We did five feedings in a row and he handled it great!
Even with an increase in breast feeding, Kellan weighed 4 pounds 12 ounces! Sometimes they worry that it takes too much energy to breast feed and they burn too many calories.
Kellan is still on .6 liters of oxygen. However, they were able to wean the concentration of oxygen to 30%. We are moving in the right direction.
This picture was taken after Kellan worked hard all day... he's worn out!

Weight Gain!

Kellan gained weight! He was 4 pounds 10 ounces tonight!
It's a good thing, too. The doctor mentioned today that if he didn't gain weight tonight, then we would have to cut back on breast feeding. Whew!!!

Our Little Peanut

Eat, sleep, and eat again!

Kellan has been stuck on 4 pounds 9 ounces since Tuesday. We are glad that he hasn't lost any weight but it's time to get back to gaining. Yesterday he had his eye exam, which went as well as we could have hoped. The blood vessels in his eyes are still slightly under developed so we will have weekly eye exams for the remainder of our stay at the nicu. We have been breast feeding four times a day since Wednesday and he is doing so well we may try 5 times tomorrow!