Flashback Friday - Miracle #2

The last Flashback Friday was about Ryan. Now it's Brooke's turn.

To make a long story short, I was in the hospital for a week battling preterm labor before Brooke's early arrival at 27 weeks 4 days (she made it 4 weeks longer than Ryan with the help of a cerclage and 17p injections). I was worried about possible complications and another rocky NICU stay, but when she was born and I actually got to hear her tiny little cry (a first for me in the OR!) I was over the moon. Then I even got to see her all wrapped up like a burrito with her little hospital blue and pink striped hat on and give her a kiss before they took to the NICU. It was.....amazing. Even though I didn't get to carry her to term, this experience was at least a little more like a full term delivery (versus Zachary and then Ryan being whisked straight to the NICU and getting only a passing glimpse and a quickly snapped polaroid to hang on to and stare at).

Brooke Elizabeth was born at 9:52pm (via c-section), weigh 2lbs. 10oz. and measuring 15in. long.

We got comments from some visitors about how tiny she was. But after having 2 babies that were 1lbs. 5oz. and 1lb. 6oz....she seemed ginormous. And she just looked like a miniature full term baby (with a little less body fat). She only ever required oxygen through the nasal cannula. She had a little bit of an issue with apnea (forgetting to breathe) and bradycardia (heart rate dips), but it resolved as she got closer to term. No infections, no complications. She came home 7 1/2 weeks after her birth, the day she turned 35 weeks gestation. It was quite a different experience for us!

Doing kangaroo care with my precious girl for the first time:

Ryan got to see his baby sister out of her isolette for the first time on her one month "birthday":

And he held her for the first time 2 weeks later:

To date, this is my favorite picture ever of the two of them!

(I feel like I should add that the only reason I didn't post more pictures of Ryan from the NICU is because most of them are saved on floppy disks...yes, you read that right. I really need to find a way to get those transferred. And the rest of them would need scanned in to the computer and we don't have a scanner right now. Someday I will post more!)