Maggie Update

CURRENT GOAL: This weeks goal is for Maggie to be taken off the oscillator and put on a regular ventillator. In order to do this they need to be able to turn down the amount of oxygen she needs while the rest of her stats remain stable.

PROGRESS: She has turned the corner!!!!! They took her off the oscillator today! She is now on a regular ventillator. Over last night they slowly notched her oxygen levels down so that today's changes were possible! We are ecstatic!

NEW GOAL: Taking her off of the Nitric Oxide machine, and weining her off the regular ventillator and all the medicine that has helped keep her comfortable and stable. We also would like to introduce her to food over this next week.

PROGRESS: They have cut her Nitric Oxide intake in half twice. She started at 20, yesterday they cut that down to 11 and now today she is at 5. The nurse said that once they get to 5, they do a countdown approach instead of cutting in half approach. So the countdown to one has started today. The nurse is optimistic that she will be off the Nitirc Oxide by tomorrow sometime.

Maggie is on several different types of medication which they will now start dialing down. Some will take longer than others for her to come off of. For example, Morphine, she has been given morphine to help make her a little more comfortable through the healing process. Morphine is an addictive drug so now as she continues to get healthy they will have to carefully cut back her intake so she will not be affected by withdrawals.

Currently Maggie is given nutrients through a drip, as she progresses in the areas mentioned above, the nurse said that they can start introducing her tummy to food. As long as she is on a ventillator we for obvious reasons can't bottle or breast feed her. I have been faithfully pumping since about an hour or so after her birth. All of the colostrum and milk I have pumped is currently frozen and being stored at Riley. This next week we are hoping to use my supply to start tube feeding her so that her body can get accustom to processing milk.

We feel truly blessed that so much has happened over the past 24 hours! God has been answering our prayers and the differences we see in her is so amazing!!!