A Really Good Night

Last night JP and I went down to say goodnight to Landon at about 9:30pm. The nurse said he was doing better than expected and had a great afternoon. We asked when we could hold him again and she suggested Kangaroo Care. JP took off his shirt and they placed Landon, tubes and all, on his chest for some skin-to-skin cuddling contact. It was amazing. His breathing, which had been hovering at around 90-100 breaths per minute went down to 30-50 bpm. They were able to turn his oxygen percentage down from the 36% to 25% (after his bad first night it had been all the way up at 53)! It was incredible seeing him so calm and happy- it was our first time to see him without a heaving chest. We had a family picture taken and sat blissfully for nearly two hours. When we got back up to my room I got to take a shower for the first time- a truly glorious event.

It was a wonderful evening- seeing him do so well and getting to really hold him made our separation so much easier to bear. Now that we have had time to accept the fact he won't be going home with us, we're much better at just enjoying the time we spend with him and looking forward to his discharge day- whenever it arrives. We had a quick visit this morning- his respiration and oxygen numbers have continued to stay down (yay!), but his bilirubin levels have gone up due to some jaundice. He'll be under the blue lights for the next couple of days to help his body break down the bilirubin (his liver isn't quite up to the task yet and usually digesting food helps, but he's still purely on the IV). We'll go down again at noon and I get to be the kangaroo!