Update on Tatum

Tatum has been in the NICU for 5 days now and she has gotten so much better! Each day that I visit her she is improving more and more. They have taken her off of oxygen and she is breathing great on her own. She also doesn't have to have that nasty feeding tube anymore, she is bottle feeding and today we had quite a bit of success with breastfeeding- I was so happy! She also doesn't need to be under the warmer anymore, her body temperature has been perfectly normal so she gets to have a regular bassinet. Of course she is still hooked up to all of the leads monitoring her heart, pulse ox, and respirations and then her IV. Poor thing, I think everyday that I am there she has a new IV site. Her blood culture did come back positive, so she did sepsis which is scary! The really scary part is that it came back positive for Group B Strep which is a bacteria that the mom carries and is passed to baby during labor. It can cause pneumonia(which is likely what Tatum had) or even menigitis and can be fatal to newborns if not caught and treated quickly. The wierd thing is that I was tested for GBS 4 days before I delivered and it was negative so we never would have known. I cannot begin to describe how grateful I am to the nursery nurse who went with her gut and had Tatum checked out because she could have gotten really sick!

Tatum her 2nd night in the NICU.
Dave and I visiting her.

This is Tatum last night, she looks so much better!

I can't wait to bring her home!