Day 11

Day 11 - Saturday

We decided to check out of the Ronald McDonald House today and finally go back home. Beyond having abandoned our puppy for the last week and a half (thank you Randy and Shawnna for taking care of her), it's been extremely rough on Landon having to commute back and forth. We decided if someone's going to have to commute, it would be easier for me to do so (my schedule can be more flexible) and then we can maintain some sort of normalcy. 

We got results from the cardiologist today on Hudson's ecco. His heart looks great, no issues with it itself at all. The issue is what the nurse practitioner had suspected- his valve/vessel isn't fully closed and is leaking (called patent ductus arterioles, PDA). 

Typically, the left side of the heart pumps blood to the body and the right side to the lungs. With PDA, extra blood is pumped into the lungs from the artery coming from the left side of the heart. The extra blood makes the heart and lungs then have to work harder. 

The dr said PDA is something that could clear up on its own. But if it doesn't, it's then something they would then address when he gets a little older- at about 6 months old. To fix it, they would thread a catheter up a blood vessel in his leg to the site and plug the leak. And from what the dr said, it would be an outpatient procedure. But I hope we don't have to do that- I'm still praying it resolves on it's own. For now, they will keep monitoring the murmur and do another ecco in a week or so.

I spent the majority of the morning and afternoon with the boys today. Colton is up on his feed amount, 32ml like his brother, and they added the calorie fortification to Hudson's now as well. Both boys are taking the majority of their feeds via bottle and both gained weight from yesterday's weigh in. 

Colton after eating 

Hudson after eating

The best part of today- I got to hold both boys together skin to skin. We sat for almost 2 hours and I read a book aloud to them.