Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Continued Progress and Photos

Okay--

At long last, I've taken some steps to organize all of Madeleine's photos. As you can now see, there are three slide shows on the blog-- one for each month. I'll continue to update the monthly photos. I can't increase the size of the slide shows on the blog but if you want to see the full size photos, you can follow this link: http://picasaweb.google.com/brentbushey. I'll try to add captions when I get some free time at night. (Yeah-- free time.) Also- I've uploaded some of my new favorites along the left side of the blog. Don't worry- if you liked one of the old photos, they're all in one of the three albums (or will be soon). I'll be editing all of the albums and adding new photos as I work to get everything organized. The May photos contain a lot of new pictures-- including pictures of Madeleine without breathing support and feeding from a bottle for the first time. You may be laughing, thinking "what's the big deal?" and I would have totally agreed with you three months ago. Now, I get excited any time I get a different angle to take a picture of Madeleine.

As far as medical updates go, Madeleine is continuing to increase feeds without any signs of trouble. She's feeding from a bottle three times/day and gets the rest of her feeds through the tube in her nose. She isn't taking all of the food from each bottle feeding and whatever is left over gets put down the tube. As she gets better with bottle feeding, they'll increase the frequency of feeds. In terms of other medication, this is the last day for antibiotics and should be near the last day for laseks. By this time next week, our goal is to be rid of all fluids going into Madeleine except for breastmilk. She'll still keep the IV in her arm since they'll need it during surgery but they'll just run a small amount of blood thinner to keep the line from clogging.

In other words, Madeleine is getting to be a pretty boring medical patient and we couldn't be happier. Surgery looks increasingly likely for early June and we expect to know more in a week once she's reached full feeds.

That's all for now-- enjoy the pictures!

Kirsten & Brent

2 comments:

Sarah Bushey said...

Holy cow!! She's living up to her name, now isn't she!! We're so proud of her and SO happy for all of you! The pictures are truly amazing - especially to look back at your journey. How far you have come. Brings me to tears every single time I think about it. You are just the most amazing people. Hugs and kisses to you down there in DC from chilly Michigan!! Can't wait for the magical day of Homecoming...

Love you!
Sarah, Joe and kiddos

Anonymous said...

A boring medical patient, what a WONDERFUL statement! Doing good with feeding...obviously has Cummings blood in her! We are so happy things are going so good, keep up the good work, Maddy!!!!!!!!
Love ya,
Mike, Wanda & boys