Our Little Miracles Have Arrived!

Most of you probably already know that we welcomed our beautiful girls into the world yesterday morning, at 30 weeks gestation. Nate and I are loving being Daddy and Mommy and want to thank everyone for all the prayers and support throughout this entire process!

Friday night, I was having some abdominal cramping, which I initially attributed to a spicy Qdoba meal that I ate that evening. Around 11:30, when it hadn't gone away, I asked my nurse to connect me to the monitor, which showed I was having regular contractions. At first, they pretty much just felt like my stomach was tightening (similar to any contractions I had previously had), but as the night went on, they became more and more uncomfortable. By 2am, I was so uncomfortable that I got a strong dose of pain meds, and I was able to sleep for about an hour before the meds wore off and I was awake and in some serious pain again. I got another dose of pain meds, and they put me on magnesium again to see if they could stop or slow the contractions. The resident told me she had a feeling we were going to have our babies that day, which was pretty hard for Nate and me to hear, considering we were hoping to make it four more weeks before having babies.

The magnesium did slow the contractions down, but I was still having them regularly and they were pretty uncomfortable. Right away at 7am, I was seen by the high risk doctor, who wanted to wait it out a few more hours but told me he had a hunch we'd be having babies by the end of the day. My discomfort kept getting worse and worse, and when I started bleeding a couple hours later (sorry, TMI), the decision was made to proceed with a c-section.

Although the surgery wasn't considered an emergency, I was prepped and brought to surgery rather quickly after deciding it was time to deliver. I didn't have much time to process what was about to happen! Thankfully, we had been prepared for what a premature delivery would look like when we met with the neonatologist only a few days prior, so we had an idea of what to expect.

The surgery went well. I did get to hear a tiny, pathetic little cry coming from one of my babies as she made her entrance into the world. Knowing she was breathing was so reassuring! As soon as the babies were delivered, they were taken into the next room where there was a NICU team ready to stabilize each of them. At that point, Nate left me to be with the newest loves of his life, Evelyn Joy and Sophie Grace.

The process of putting me all back together felt like it took forever, but Nate and my amazing nurses went back and forth between the babies and me and kept me informed of how the babies were doing. The babies were breathing on their own, but were hooked up to CPAP to help with their respiratory effort. This was not a surprise to us. After the initial phase of my recovery, my nurses wheeled me over to the stabilization room so I could catch a quick glance at my babes before they were wheeled down to the NICU... they were so beautiful!

During recovery, both sets of grandparents also arrived. After grabbing lunch, Nate took them to the NICU to meet their very first grandbabies! All four of them are as smitten with the girls as Nate and I are. The Grandpas and Grandmas stayed for a while last night and were here for a good portion of the day today too. It was so nice to have them here and share this exciting time with them!

The girls are doing very well, considering they were born 10 weeks prematurely. Evelyn (baby A) weighed in at 3 lb., 3 oz. and Sophie (baby B) weighed 2 lb. 7 oz. The estimates from the ultrasound we had 4 days prior were right on! The biggest concern for early babies is their respiratory status. Their lungs aren't fully developed, and it just takes some time for them to be able to breathe like a term baby would. All day yesterday and until this afternoon, the girls were both on CPAP, but when their oxygen requirements increased today, the decision was made to put a breathing tube down so that the doctors could administer surfactant right into their lungs. Surfactant is a chemical that helps to keep the air sacs in the lungs open, and babies don't produce a whole lot of it on their own when they're as young as Evie and Sophie. The steroids I received before delivery are meant to stimulate surfactant production, but the girls needed even more... they are hoping that, now that the girls have gotten their surfactant, the breathing tubes can be removed within the next day or two.

Since 30 weekers haven't yet learned to coordinate sucking/swallowing/breathing, they each have a feeding tube that goes into their stomach that can be used for breastmilk (and formula, if more calories are needed). For now, they are also receiving nutrition through their central lines, which will be discontinued after a while. In a few weeks, hopefully, we will be able to breast feed and/or bottle feed.

We're aware that things could have turned out much differently for our two peanuts. We thank God that they have arrived safely, and that they seem to be doing as well as expected for 30 weekers! We could not be more in love with our little miracles. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for praying us through this rough time.

I'll post pictures soon, but for now, I'm going to go snuggle my daughters. :)