Thursday 10th April

Niamh is 9 weeks today! I can't believe how quick that has gone! Wow! We had a good day today. I was lucky enough to get a skin to skin cuddle with her that was really nice. She was looking up at me a couple of times and the rest of the time she slept :) I also gave her a teeny tiny micro breastfeed, just a couple of little sucks before she fell asleep again but she knew what to do.

The swab hadn't come back from her eye yet, although it looks much better so hopefully all is good. Her nails are so long, I must remember to take a nail file in tomorrow to shorten them. She has put on 60g again overnight, but she is also puffy so the doctors have given her a diuretic to move the fluid along. The lady from the PIPIN trial came today as well to take Niamh's head and length measurements. I cant't remember the exact lengths but she has grown 1cm in both places so thats great. I will get the figures and update the growth chart.

Niamh is wearing the little suit my sis bought for her, thankyou! :)

Niamh is now the official Baby of the Month for April on the Early Birds website (Thankyou Lynda)! Go to www.earlybirds.com.au and click on Earlybird Club on the left hand side to see Niamh! She was on CPAP at the time the photo was taken and just managed to get it off for a quick photo :)

We also had the education session again today, these are every Thursday and today we were provided with food! Well thats a good enough reason to go! :) It was yummy, and of course, very informative! :)

There was one interesting new mum there, last week I was very curious about her. We were asked the question "What is it like to be a NICU/SCBU mum" and she said 'Great' in a very light and airy manner, she was quite serious too, no sarcasm detected.
Tell me I'm crazy, but I couldnt think of anything worse than having a new baby in intensive care or the special care baby unit. I found out today that she has only been here a week and should be home next week so she is blissfully unaware of the trauma that comes with having one so early and being in it for the longhaul.

I was asked how I found expressing and I explained that at first I was very angry about it as I had 17 long weeks ahead of me and I was finding it very hard. Its just as mentally difficult as it is physical and I wasnt coping too well at first with not having my daughter at home with me. There are so many thoughts that you have it takes a while to accept how things are, but I think I have now. 'New Mum's' comment was a patronising 'Oh, but its sooo worth it'! Aaaah!! As if we dont know that! Anyway, we did have a good laugh about it and consoled ourselves with the fact that she was clueless and lucky to be so blissfully ignorant.

Gosh, that turned into a bit of a rant didn't it? It wasnt meant to be! Just gives you an idea of some of the things we come across here. That and lots of differing opinions on how things should be done but thats another vent!

I have uploaded lots of pics today as I didn't do many yesterday, plus some video of Niamh sucking her fingers. I love, love, love the hat she is wearing today, this was kindly crocheted by a good friend of mine who is multi talented in all sorts of crafty areas! Thank you Clair, it looks great doesn't it?! It fits her really well too.