Please Pray Today

Things are still going well with Karis but she has hit a minor bump in the road. Here's the good news: she has come COMPLETELY off of oxygen and her breathing is doing much better! They have also removed the feeding tube from her throat and replaced it with one through her nose that won't gag and aggravate her. Less than good news: she's not progressing quite as quickly as the doctor would like to see. She is still retracting a little when she breathes and the second set of x-rays still show some stuff in her lungs. She also has something going on with her bowels that could be causing some stomach problems and preventing her from digesting her milk like she should. Because of these things, the doctor is keeping her in the nursery another day and feeding her only through IV - no nursing with her mom or even getting milk through the tube. The doctor has consulted with another doctor at the NICU in Macon and they feel that it's best to give her another day to move things along through her intestines and let her lungs mature some more. Of course, this makes us very sad, but we want Karis to get everything she needs while she's here. We don't want to rush anything or move her to the next stage before it's time.

She also has slightly elevated bilirubin levels, causing a minor case of jaundice. Since she's already in the nursery, they put her on a biliblanket and under a light to help her body break down the bilirubin and get rid of it.

The doctor said that the situation hasn't changed - we're still dealing with the same diagnosis and it will resolve itself. She's just taking her precious time! This condition is common in C-section babies but most of them are off oxygen and are nursing by now; because Karis is taking longer than usual she is out of the range of "normal" for this condition. The doctor has mentioned a couple of times that her age may have been a little off... it is possible that she wasn't a full 38 weeks when she was born, which would explain the extra time needed for all of this.

Please pray for Karis today. Pray that her lungs will clear up and her intestines will move along like normal.

We've added a few more pictures to our Facebook photo album. Check out the link in the "Detour" post.