Saturday... discharge soon?!?!?

Of course as soon as we got up we called the hospital to see how Ethan was doing. They said that they had a good night and asked if we would be coming to rounds (this is where the nurses talk with the doctors each morning to talk about their plan for Ethan for the day.) Once we got to the hospital Mark went to rounds as I needed to pump. He came back and told me all sorts of good news! He said that they were going to start to feed him today and that they are trying to get a flight arranged for tomorrow or Monday for Ethan and I to go back to MT! Yeah! I have been really excited to hear a conversation about discharge... originally it for being discharged to take our baby home but for now this will work... I am excited to get back to MT! The nurse had talked about possibly taking him off the ventilator and possibly putting him on the cpap or even the canula! The Dr. decided it would be best to wait to do that until he got back to MT though so that he had the ventilator for a good supply of oxygen when he flies.

The nurse even asked us if we wanted to hold him today because he was doing so good! Ahhh! What? I didn't think we could hold him when he had the ventilator in? So Mark and I talked about it and of course we really want to but we decided to wait until tomorrow. It's such a scary thing for us yet since the last time (and only time) that I got to hold him he went down hill shortly after. Yeah that was probably something that was going to happen anyway but still. We know that holding him will most likely help him though we just want him to have one full day of doing good and not being moved around much.

They started to feed him (of course through his tube) at noon. Their plan was to feed him to 2ml's every 3 hours. At 3 they checked his stomach to see if he had digested the milk and he still had a lot in his stomach but they gave him another 2 ml's. Then at 6 they found that the milk was getting digested in his stomach so of course they were continuing to do the feedings. Yeah! I'm so excited that Ethan is finally getting some real food! The last few times they tried feeding him it wasn't getting digested properly so then they would stop and then restart it again. So I was happy to hear that the feeding was going well!

Since there was talk of going home my mom changed her flight. She was supposed to fly out on Tuesday morning but since we were going home on Sunday or Monday she changed her flight to Sunday. So we did dinner with Rudy's Uncle Tony and Aunt Ella at their house. He made an excellent moose steak and salmon. It was all really good. Mark had a good time just chatting with Tony as he is a very interesting guy.

Of course once we got back to the hotel we called to see how Ethan was doing and he was still doing really good. Feedings were still doing good and they said the flight for Ethan and I will most likely go out on Monday. Mark is set to fly out Monday morning as well. Wow... to think that I am really excited to go back to another NICU but I really am. Seattle is very pretty but I am definitely ready to go back to MT!

We have fallen asleep in many uncomfortable spots lately... here is Mark sleeping on a desk chair backwards... poor guy!

Here is Ethan with my prayer bear ;)