The road home

Hey everyone

It has been a whirlwind of activity for the past few days, with Sophie getting better and better and gaining weight like crazy. It seems like all of a sudden she was a big healthy baby and the nurses started to talk about her going home! HOME!

She's still in isolation while we wait for the result of her eye swab for the pseudomonas bacteria. You really can't tell she has any kind of infection, and she just seems to be getting bigger by the minute. Her nurse (Bonnie, who we absolutely love) is working to get her into a cot in the next few days. Bonnie is working with us on discharge planning, so she lets us take Sophie out of her isolette, bathe and diaper and dress her on our own. I love taking care of her, and it makes me want to hurry her up to get home.

In order for her to be discharged, she has to be off of the caffeine, have had no spells for a week and breastfeeding every meal and gaining weight. It seems like a tall order, but our girl is up for a challenge. Bonnie said we're probably looking at 3 to 4 weeks. It's hard not to try to push her to get home faster. I would love to have her here for Christmas, but she needs to come when she is really ready. I tried breastfeeding for the first time on Sunday, and Sophie did really well. She didn't fuss too much, and even took a couple of sucks. Yesterday we tried again and she did even more. Bonnie said she's a smart girl. We think so too.

All of this talk of home made us realize how incredibly underprepared we are to have her here. Once she is breastfeeding, I have to live with her at the hospital, and I haven't got her nursery ready at all. We've scurried in the last couple of days to register for baby stuff, find a car seat, look at cribs and furniture, buy paint for her room and clean it out to get ready for painting. While we were at Toys R Us last night looking at car seats, I had a sudden surge of joy that this moment had come. We are so very lucky and grateful to have our beautiful girl, and I can't wait to have her at home. I have a feeling that I have absolutely no idea how much my life is going to change when she's here but I can't wait to see what it will become.