Recovering nicely

Clara is recovering well from her operation last week. You can tell from her photo above that she’s comfortable, those arms up in the air whilst she’s fast asleep says it all!!

Every day the doctors and surgeons review Clara to check her progress. From checking her wounds to reviewing the infection markers in her blood, they look at every detail. It’s incredible really – they look after so many babies but treat each one truly as an individual.

Clara is still on morphine but the quantity has been reduced. It was dropped too quickly two days ago and she was clearly uncomfortable. Nothing would settle her, she was feeling the pain. The morphine was increased again to previous levels and she was much more settled. Today, her morphine has reduced again slightly and she’s still very happy which Is a great sign of improvement.

We also need to monitor her output. She can wee normally, but her stomach waste is collected two ways. She has a nasal gastric (NG) tube collecting waste that comes up out of her stomach via the tube in her nose, and a pipe attached to the tube coming out of her stomach. We have been waiting for days to start seeing waste come out of her tummy as this suggests her bowel is working. Over the last two days we have seen a small amount, but today, for the first time, more has come out of Clara’s tummy via her bowel than her nose. Hopefully we will have a very happy surgeon when he visits later!

We’ve been having lots of cuddles with Clara now she’s free from her oxygen pipe. And by lots I mean hours and hours. Yesterday I had 4.5 hours of cuddling Clara without moving from this seat once. A numb backside and no lunch is worth it! Today’s the same, well over three hours of cuddles so far and I’m not moving anytime soon! Although perhaps I shouldn’t have drunk so much water this morning… Even Clara’s Daddy has had some beautiful skin to skin cuddles which I truly believe is so important for Clara’s wellbeing.

Clara’s also been busy growing! She’s put on weight and now weighs 2.69 kilos so she can have more fluid (food). Her already long legs are getting so long she’s needing to start wearing Up to One Month size sleepsuits, even though they’re huge everywhere else on her!

I’ve also just been told Clara will move from an incubator to a cot bed today, and I can bring in some of Clara’s pretty dresses and other outfits.

My little girl really feels like my little girl today.