Five weeks: breastfeeding and other updates

So as I sit here expressing at 2.30am I thought it was a good opportunity to send an update on our progress. If I was still pregnant, the babies would be at 34 weeks now, but they are actually five weeks old today.

 

34 weeks was the stage I was aiming to be sectioned at so it is strange to think that I could have been about to have the babies if all had been plain sailing! To think how well they are progressing when they are not even supposed to be born yet is fascinating. My friend gave me some great advice for the tough days when you’re going in and out of hospital wishing they were home with you: “class these as bonus days as they are still supposed to be in your tummy.”

 

Elliot and Rebecca are in cots now. They start off in 'hot cots' where they lie on a heated mattress and the heat is gradually turned down day by day until, after a week or so the heat is turned off altogether. Róisín should be in a hot cot before the weekend as she was 1.54kg yesterday and is steadily putting on weight each day.

 

The triplets are also getting to grips with bottle feeding at the moment. They have to be moved gradually from tube feeding to bottle feeding before they can come home. They all took their first bottle when they were four weeks old and did a great job. Elliot's face was a picture, not impressed that he had to work to get his food instead of just chilling and having a full tummy through the tube. He is getting to grips with it slowly but I still think that since he is so completely chilled out, he would like his food the easy way every time.

 

They use NUK bottles in The Coombe for premature babies as the teats are supposedly more like the nipple and they are a smaller shape, so my Avent bottles that I have at home will need to be introduced once they are term and are a bit bigger.

 

I go into hospital each day and get to do the full run of feeds at 11.30am and normally the 2.30pm feed too. They are all on three hourly feeds now so I just work through one after the other after the other. I get to hold each one of them and give them a bottle feed or try them with breastfeeding.

 

 

They are getting to grips with the breastfeeding gradually. With this, Elliot is the strongest and is managing to have a good go for about half an hour. I will try Rebecca again today as she has only managed to have a suck for a few minutes so far, as has Róisín. They say their sucking motion really kicks in at 34 weeks so hopefully they will now improve day by day with the bottle and breast feeding.

 

Since the start of the week I have been doing the full feed by myself. This involves changing their nappy and then bottle feeding each one, which is taking me two hours to complete. Then I express, grab a quick lunch and suddenly it’s time to start again. Luckily the babies and I are still learning and each day we get quicker. My husband gets two weeks paternity leave and is waiting to take that when at least two of the babies are home. My mum is then going to come over for four weeks. My parents-in-law are only around the corner, so with that help it will make things easier too.

 

The babies will come home in such a good routine though. They are only handled around feed times and so we will need to be quite strict with that and not handle them too much. Just save cuddle time for feed times – for us and for visitors. Yesterday the nurse and I gave the babies some cuddle time in Rebecca's cot after each one had been fed. They all snuggled into the cot and went to sleep for an hour and half very peacefully, with no alarms going off from their heartbeat monitors. They were so settled and it was lovely to see them together.

 

I went to a baby resuscitation class a couple of weeks ago in preparation for the babies coming home. It was excellent and showed you the way to deal with a situation when you get to the cot and find the baby not breathing. Hopefully this will never happen but it is better to be prepared. It was an excellent class with really clear steps. The trainer also gave us lots of useful tips on preparation of the cot and putting them to bed, and also bottle preparation too. Hopefully my husband and I will go again next week so I can just refresh and he feels prepared.

 

As time goes by, they get nearer to being ready to come home so we need to make sure we have all the information and are as prepared as we can be. We have the nursery finished, so I think we’re off to a good start.