Update from dad

Over the weekend Mckinley hit the number we have been waiting for which was 4 pounds and last night she was over 4 lbs 2 ounces which means she has doubled her weight! Very cool. She should be off of external heat any day now and will be moved to an open bed. Two criteria for bringing her home are checked off(or at least will be anytime now). The last thing we have to focus on is getting Mckinley to take all eight of her feedings from a bottle instead of through the feeding tube. Right now we are doing two bottles a day and those are always pretty sketchy. She has heart drops, breathing problems, spits up, and lets milk run out the sides of her mouth. A big problem has been that right when we start giving her a bottle she decides it is a great time to try and go to the bathroom. She has far from mastered that art and so trying to eat and relieve herself at the same time is just way too much for her to handle.

Although switching to bottles has not been the easiest process, we trust she will get it eventually. Hopefully as of today we are 2-3 weeks from bringing her home. She wasn't expected to come home before March 17th so late February or early March would be such a cool thing. We are really ready to get her home but thankfully it has been a positive wanting and not a bad thing so far for the most part. Kat has been amazing at keeping her own spirits up. Spending at least 3 hours in a windowless hospital room surely isn't what she was hoping for but focusing on all the blessings that God has graciously given us has made it pretty easy to keep our spirits up. Thinking back to the day when the doctor first told us Mckinley was going to come early and the difference in how I thought that would play out and how it actually did is a wild experience and always reminds me what a great situation we are in.

I posted this on Facebook the other day but Mckinley finally has true nipples. She was born so early that they weren't visible but over the weeks they have formed to the point that you can see them now. I know she will kill me one day if she ever knows I was so amazed by this but I just am. It just is one example of how we were able to watch a 26 week old fetus born far too early develop into a baby. Such a cool experience. If/when we get pregnant again and we make it this far we will be able to look at early pictures of Mckinley and really know what that baby looks like inside of Kat. That is just really cool to me.

Anyways, if you are wanting to pray for us one big prayer request is that we can progress to more bottles so we can get our baby home and stop having that feeling that someone is missing when we are at home.

Brandon