Oxygen Monitor Off

Diana got her oxygen monitor off today as she has been able to control her breathing consistently for a few days now. One less cord to worry about when you are holding her. Now she only has one cord that monitors her heart rate, how many breaths she is taking in a minute, and blood pressure/pulse. She still has her feeding tube. We try to only hold her when it is time to feed her as she really needs to rest to build up her strength for eating. This has probably been the hardest thing, not being with her all the time and then not holding her as often as I would like. We also limit her being held by only 2 people at a time, the handing off back and forth really tires her out. They moved her feedings up to 48 ml every 3 hours now. I went and nursed her at 11 am and 5 pm today. We are going to weigh her every time now before and after I nurse her to see how much she is eating. At the 11 am feeding she took 15 ml from me but then only took about 10 ml from the bottle. At the 5 pm feeding she nursed really well in my opinion but the scale said she weighed the same so that is a tad frustrating. She was really wide awake at the 5 pm feeding and Brad noticed that her eyes are focusing better and they track together now. The nurse helped me feed her the bottle and got about 15 ml in her. She was having some tummy issues tonight and think that could have been part of the problem. Her bilirubin level was high today 11.5, she must be below 12 or they will put her under the lights. I thought she looked a little yellow today so they are checking it again tomorrow. The nurse is also going to ask for a development consult to come and give us some exercises to help straighten out her feet. Since Diana was breech the whole time, her feet turn in and although you can straighten them when you try, she doesn't do this on her own and it isn't getting any better over the past few days. We are also going to try tonight gavage feeding, through her tube, every other time and see if that helps give her strength to eat from the bottle.