Quite Possibly My Favorite Day Ever.

Sophie is home!! Today is the day we've been waiting for, of course, since the babies were born, but even more in the last 17 days while Evelyn was home and we all had to kiss Sophie goodbye each night. After 55 days, our family is finally together! :)

As I mentioned last week, Sophie made an amazing turn around after her antibiotics were started. Almost immediately, she started drinking her bottles (which she had never gotten good at), became more alert, and just seemed so much healthier overall. If you remember from when Evelyn came home, one of the criteria to come home is that babies need to nipple (bottle or nurse) for 48 hours straight without having to use their feeding tube. By Sunday night, Sophie had done it! She had met all criteria to come home, but still needed to finish out her ten days of antibiotics. I tried to get the doctors to switch the antibiotics to oral so we could give them to her at home, but I had no luck. So, for the last five days, we have just been waiting (impatiently) for Friday to get here so we could take her home... and hoping that nothing went wrong that would delay this very exciting event! Luckily, everything went as planned for once, and we were able to leave the NICU early this afternoon!

Our family, ready to hit the road! As you can see, we are all thrilled, except Evie.

The girls in their car seats. If it weren't for Sophie's bald spot where her PICC line was, I don't know if I could tell them apart!

The girls ready to come home and never return! (Hopefully)

Daddy holding both of his girls at HOME!

Since arriving at home, we have just been showing Sophie the ropes of the Vander Ploeg household. She and Evie enjoyed a nap together, have been drinking their bottles, and chilling in their Rock-N-Plays, in addition to enjoying some snuggle time with mom and dad. :) As I write this, both of the girls have started fidgeting a little and will probably be ready for a bottle soon.

I was so thankful this week that Sophie was finally going to be able to come home, especially because we did have a major disappointment yesterday. Unfortunately, my breast milk continues to have Group B strep in it. Like I had mentioned before, this is a normal bacteria in many people's bodies, but it can cause severe infections in babies, like it did for Sophie. In fact, it can get even worse than it was for her and cause meningitis leading to severe, long-term neurological problems. The neonatologists and infectious disease specialists (who have never seen a case like this before), unfortunately, recommended that I stop breast feeding and that both girls start formula immediately. This was such a disappointment for Nate and me, given all the time and effort we have put into breast feeding and creating a store of breast milk to give to our babies. On the other hand, giving one or both of the girls another infection is a risk we are not willing to take. We're thankful we were able to breast feed them for 2 months, but it's still a huge bummer. We've been working on thawing our stored breast milk in small batches, and *sniff sniff* dumping it down the drain. :(

I'm done venting...I have a LOT to be thankful for!

Sophie's repeat echocardiogram showed that her PDA (the hole in her heart) was "tiny." It went from "large" to "tiny" in a week! The doctor thinks it will most likely close on its own, but Sophie will be seen by a cardiologist in 4-6 months to reevaluate. If it doesn't close on its own, and as long as it doesn't cause any problems, she will probably have to have it fixed by a minimally invasive procedure when she is one or two-ish.

We would appreciate your prayers as we adjust to life at home with our two precious baby girls.

As always, I want to THANK YOU for your prayers and support through this journey. We have been so touched and blessed to be so loved and cared about by our family and friends and also complete strangers. A special shout out to Abi Arendsen, who prayed for our babies in a precious little psalm she wrote in her preschool class. :)

Love,
The VPs - Together at last :)