2-18

We're having a little rough day here at the Chu vacation home at Lebonheur.  Lydia's having a hard time with her immunizations and has been refusing to take her bottle feedings since last night.  When I was trying to give her her 11:00 feeding she had a major desat ( O2 at 41 and heartrate to 90) and had to have some blow by oxygen to pull her numbers back up.  It scared me to death, and it also got her a free ride for feedings for a while because they had to put her NG tube back in.  For today at least she'll be getting all of her feedings via the tube and hopefully will be able to rest and get better quickly.  This does delay her going home time until she's able to gain weight consistently and get back on full PO feeds.  We've had so many good days in a row that we were halfway expecting a hard day to come.  So now it's here, in my opinion, it can leave now.

Penelope had a rough night last night as well.  She continued with her tachypnea (breathing too fast) but with an increase in her oxygen flow and percentage of oxygen she's doing a little better.  A chest x-ray this morning showed that her right upper lung is holding some fluid so she's been put on diuretics to help clear it out.  We started noticing that her face was a little swollen yesterday so hopefully all of that will subside soon.  She's still not 100% sure of her suck/swallow/breath but is working on it.  And I don't know if I mentioned this before or not but her IV was removed so she has pretty blankets on her bed now.  Maybe she was breathing so quickly because she was excited about the blankets....or maybe not.

Personally, I'm having a harder time with this little set back than I expected.  It's most likely just the culmination of all of the stresses, lack of sleep, concern for friends and family in their own tough situations, and also being disappointed that Monday isn't going to be the day.  I'm just having the hardest time keeping myself pulled together emotionally.  Then there's the whole cycle of being upset, getting mad that you're upset, getting embarrassed, then getting upset about being embarrassed...etc...etc..etc.  The good news is, one little glance at either one of my beautiful baby girls makes it all seem doable.  It's odd to me that they're the reason for the stress (by no fault of their own..but still) and also the remedy (yes, Dad, I know that would be a good song :)).  Isn't it amazing how God both allows the difficulty and provides for the way out of it? 

Specific Prayer

• Lydia's appetite to return
• Penelope's breathing to regulate and lungs to clear up
• both of them to grow and thrive
• Jonathan and I to remember all of the information we're being taught once they're home!