Finally Home!

It took us exactly 5 weeks but we are all home sleeping under one roof.

The plan (as I blogged yesterday) was to come home today, Friday. Yesterday about 2:30 while Karen was out picking up a few things, Dr. Watson-Fraley came by to check on Porter. She asked me if we wanted to go home today, Thursday. She cautioned that she didn't want me to feel like we were being pushed out, but she just had so much confidence in Porters progression.

It took til almost 7:30 to do paper work and load the car, but we got it done and got home about 8:30. It all happened perfectly. It just so happened that Kelly and Grant were bringing Charlie up to see us. So, we all 4 got to come home together.

We stopped at McDonalds for supper and as I was passing Charlie his Happy Meal, he ask Karen and Me, "Where's Porter's Happy Meal?"

Porter does have an apnea monitor to alarm us if his heart rate or respiratory rate gets too high or too low. He is to be eating 40 or mL's every 3 hours or if he will take 50 mL's we can let him go 4 hours between feedings. Well, he has been eating 60 mL's every 3 hours. So, needless to say, he has an appetite.

As far as home and visitors; we are trying to emulate the NICU for Porter and keep most of the same rules. Obvious precautions have to be taken though as he is still not supposed to be out of Karen's tummy for another month. We are going to try to keep a very low key environment around here with only two visitors at a time and a limited number of visits per day.

Please keep us in your prayers as we navigate these waters on our own without the positive reinforcements from docs and nurses and without all the dings and dongs of the monitors telling us what we need to do.

May God bless you all as he has us!

-dad