We didn’t get to sleep until around 2 or 3 in the morning last night. We had so many different members of the staff come talk to us. Now I know why healthcare costs are so high. We probably have a team of 50 that are dealing with us behind the scenes. Right now I’m guessing the total hospital bill will be around $1 million. We’ll have to wait and see what the final numbers will bring us. Thank goodness for insurance!

The labs came back on Tobie’s placenta. Yep, she had a strep infection down there. Our nurse said it’s better to deliver early than deliver an infected baby. Talking to the Neonatalogist, we got lucky we delivered when we did. That type of infection is a killer for the babies. As soon as the babies were delivered, they were put on antibiotics. Paige’s cultures were growing which meant she did have some sort of infection, but since we caught all of this so early, she should be fine. Paige did have a blood transfusion last night. They assured us that all preemie babies will have blood transfusions at some time.

The doctors reaffirmed that our babies are doing the best they could possibly be given their early welcoming into the world. Dr. Abrams also talked about what waits ahead. It’s not pretty. There is a 50% survival rate the first week of life. If they make it to day 7, that changes to 80 – 90%. They get their first ultrasound on Tuesday. That will tell us if there is anything going on in their little heads. Bleeding in the brain is a real concern. The doctor told us that none of our babies are showing any signs of anything wrong with them right now, so that’s good. There is a good chance one of the babies will have some sort of surgery within the first couple of weeks. Again, he was just stating the statistics for preemies. He said just take it one day at a time and to prepare ourselves for a rollar coaster ride. The chances of all 3 babies not having any problems would be rare.

We were able to wheel Tobie down to the NICU to meet her kids. It was the first of many visits. She still is in a lot of pain when she stands up and walks. They want her to walk around the nurse’s station each day. This helps in the healing process. We made it around once today. Dr. Lynn wanted her to do 4 laps. Maybe tomorrow? We are also going to start breast pumping today. They want to start feeding the babies. Since they have so many tubes in them, the chance of infection is high. If they can start growing and they can remove some tubes, that will help with their recovery. Right now they would get about 1cc of food, which is less than a tablespoon I think. Maybe we can start marketing the preemie diet to the masses!