Hey all,

A bit of an update on the twins & Nat – they’re all doing pretty well.

Nat is recovering well, and is now off the tubes and is able to toddle about the bathroom by herself. I still have to push her about (only chance I get!) on a wheel chair when we want to duck downstairs to check out the babies, as their in the Neonatal Intensive Care unit. She’s got a lot of colour back and is pretty perky… wants to spend more time downstairs of course!

Alex is doing well too. He was the smaller one of the two, being on the donor end of the twin to twin transfusion which is one of the reasons why we took them out in the first place. He’s a little thin, but quite long, and has big hands and feet. Nat’s already rubbing it in that they’re both probably going to be bigger than their daddy… I got to quieten him down before as he was having a bit of a squalling fit. This involved my keeping his limbs cupped inside my hands, just to make him feel like he was back in the womb. He calmed down fairly well once I did that, and I just hung out like that with him for 20 – 30 minutes.

Jack is causing us a little consternation. He was the bigger one, and rather than being the more developed one, as you would assume for his size, it means that his body wasn’t quite developed enough to keep up with his growth. One of the triggers for us (as well as the twin to twin transfusion) was that they noticed that he had developed a bit of a dicky ticker. The entry valve for his right ventricle (the one that receives blood back from the body) was either all gummed up, getting a bit more solid for some reason, or the increased fluid was causing an increase of pressure and not allowing it to work as well as it could. Adding to this, the right ventricle of the heart had expanded a bit, causing a weakening of the wall. Today this has led to lower blood pressure than they’d like, and they’re thinking that this is because the right ventricle isn’t filling properly, meaning it’s kinda like a pump that doesn’t have quite enough water in it – lots of pumping, but not much motion. They’re going to try him on some medication to soften that right ventricle, but if that doesn’t work they’ll keep him going till he gets to about 2kg (about 6 – 8 weeks_ and then he’ll be big enough to do an operation on to see if they can manually fix the issue.

The other issue today with Jack is that they haven’t been able to run a good line into one of his arterys to get blood from and also to provide them the option of pulling out specimens when needed. They’ve literally been trying on and off all day, with no luck. Poor little guy is starting to either look like a pin cushion or junkie, neither of which is a good thing! Hopefully they can get one into him soon. They were even trying with the help of an ultrasound machine before, but no luck

Well, Nat’s having a well earned nap now – she’s doing great, but this recovering business really takes it out of you, plus the worry about our boys.

I’m amazingly pleased that things are going as well as they could be really, considering, and I just hope that Jack stabilizes and they can get a line into him. Poor little one. I’ll try and update the following facebook gallery with new photos every day, so feel free to check back on the link below if you’re not actually on facebook – you don’t need to be a member

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=221618&id=568230350&l=ad102027ef

Its a long weekend over here, so that gives us 3 days to get Nat recovered enough and hang out with the boys. Then Nat will hang out with the boys and I’ll head into work for a good proportion of the time that I’m supposed to be there. I’ll be saving my time off till we get to take them home, as it’ll be great to have a couple of weeks off with the family

News updates as they come, and thanks to everyone for their best wishes. I’m sure that Jack and Alex are going to be perfect eventually, but every bit of good karma they receive from you guys is definitely a help I’m sure. Please forward this to anyone whom I may have left off the list, or didn’t have the email address for.

J

PS, for those of you who weren’t aware that we were having twins or that they’ve come already, we had two identical boys, who were delivered early due to some complications. They came at about 4pm on May 20, weighing 850g (Alex) and 995g (Jack).

PPS, just came from the NICU where I chatted to a cardio dr, who believed that Jack’s heart was looking better today, although it is baby steps. Apparently, as the “donor”, or receiver of blood from Alex in the womb, Jack’s blood got much thicker, and that may be causing the problem with both his dicky ticker and the lack of being able to get a proper line into him. In trying to get a line into him this afternoon, they targeted the right groin artery, but must have somehow managed to get it to constrict, which has caused his right leg to go white. Well, earlier it was white, but now it’s a shade of yellow and there is some pinking in his toes, which should mean that life is coming back into it. So they’re in the process of getting lots of fluids into him, and are also reducing the adrenaline/epinephrine they have him on, as that thickens the blood too.

PPPS, can you tell it’s taken me most of the afternoon to write this?