When the alarm went off Thursday morning... everything seemed uber surreal. We were going to spend another day with this baby girl who could quite possibly be our daughter - Amy's first, my 3rd (and a half - Chas). Our plan today, before going to the NICU, was to stop by the birth family's house to pick-up the signed 'Temporary Guardianship' forms and a fresh batch of breast milk. We told the birth mother that we would meet her around 10am.
When we showed up, we pulled into the driveway of their split level home in an adorable neighborhood with big yards (so green... HOW are all the yards so green.... it really struck me on our way in). As soon as we pulled up and texted her, she came out with their golden retriever and a target grocery bag. This big ole golden was so excited to be alive and super stoked to meet new friends. Bruce. Cool, goofy 4 year old pup.
Amy and I spent the better part of an hour chatting with the birth mom in the driveway. Difficult (and necessary) questions were asked and answered. We talked about toddlers, babies, parents, pets, breast milk, crappy social workers, and much more. We left with fresh breast milk and no guardianship papers (directly the result of the crappy social worker). More on that UNNECESSARY headache later...
Ames and I got to the hospital in time for Logan's 11am feeding with coaching from the speech therapist. I volunteered to attempt a fairly unfamiliar bottle feeding process. Amy might have explained this in the previous posts, and I am going to review this process just in case I am mistaken... Logan has a floppy esophagus (Tracheomalacia and Laryngomalacia). As such, she has a G-Tube to receive nourishment - known in our newest community as a "tubie". She also receives 15 mL from a bottle at each feeding as well. The reasoning behind this is that she fatigues when drinking from a bottle, and essentially, the odds of aspiration increase over the course of a single bottle feeding. Therapists and doctors believe that small, gradual bottle feedings can strengthen the tissues and ligaments in the region and (hopefully) eventually lead to her not needing a G-Tube. The bottle feedings are actually really cool... just really different than any I have ever done before.
For Logan's bottle feeds, she lays on her side along the length of your leg (head at your knee); her legs are curled into the fetal position against your abdomen. Her ear, shoulder, and hip are aligned providing for a straight shot from her mouth down through her esophagus to her stomach. The bottle she is using is a Dr. Brown's medical grade 60 mL bottle with an ultra-premie nipple (the MOST restricted nipple flow available). The bottle has 15mL of breast milk (thanks to her amazing birth mom). She is given the bottle for approximately three or four sucks, and then the bottle is tilted to allow the milk to flow away from the nipple, while still keeping the nipple in her mouth allowing for her to sustain suction. Laying her on her side allows the milk to pool in her cheek rather the back of her throat and the break means that the dry sucks encourage her to swallow what has pooled in her cheek. That tricky part is that this wonder woman has quite the appetite and does NOT enjoy being regulated. Anyway - the 15mL takes about 15-20 minutes for her to finish.
Sometimes, Logan begins to fatigue at 5 mL of the bottle. When she begins to fatigue, you can hear quite the strider (kinda wheezing), or gulps (yep just like the rest of us), or maybe she just sounds super congested. If this happens, we offer the binki to see if that will calm her sucking and allow for her to clear her airway sufficiently. If she clears up, we continue with the bottle. If not, we pour the rest of the bottle milk into the feed bag and gets the rest of the feed through the G-Tube.
As the day progressed, we got coaching from the speech therapist (essentially coaching us through the process I described above), we met with the doctor, we chatted with the social worker and the case manager, and spent the rest of the day getting amazing Logan snuggles .
From a paperwork, legal, adoption standpoint, we had a bit of annoyance to deal with... now keep in mind that the birth parents are AMAZING humans and not like anyone either of us have ever met. The hospital staff is DYNAMITE!!! Our attorney is fabulous as well. The social worker who is part of the adoption agency, though, is a HOT mess. Now, I am not talking about a superhero, over-worked school or county social worker. I am talking about a person who works for ONE agency and handles ONLY paperwork for adoptions that flow through this one agency. This particular social worker (whose name and employer I will leave unnamed to protect the incompetent) showed up to the birth parents house to have the initial consent/surrender conversation with them. The social worker showed up (after rescheduling) and presented the birth parents with papers that had incorrect information about them (addresses, phone numbers, etc) AND it included double sided copies of OTHER PEOPLE'S adoption paperwork - not our, not theirs. A third party!! She showed up with papers that need to be witnessed and notarized with a witness AND she forgot to bring her notary stamp! All of this had consequences that went beyond merely being annoying. This meant that first and foremost, the parents were unable to hand over guardianship (as they had hoped), meaning that Amy and I could NOT make medical decisions about Logan. It also meant that the social worker had to bother the birth parents AGAIN, rehashing this entire process for them AGAIN. This woman's dishevelment was unprofessional, inconsiderate, disrespectful, and annoying.
As for Logan, the more we get to know this tiny human, the more we learn what she is telling us. We increasingly are able to recognize her micro-expressions and her squeaks, her gurgles and her giggles. This kiddo is going to teach us so much in the years to come, and I cannot wait to see what the future brings - as long as everything goes as we anticipate.