Shira Nabi Hanauer
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Week One |
Shira's first week of life was spent in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). It made spending time with her difficult, but every day she improved more and more.
Dad holding up Shira's footprints, given to us by the NICU nurses.
Spending quality time with Shira.
Two days after delivery, and Sung looks fantastic.
Eyes open, but still intubated.
The monitor from Shira's ventilator, showing the "pressure loops" and the various settings keeping her alive while the machine breathed for her.
She was hooked up to a lot of devices and monitors in the NICU, including this one showing her "vital signs", including blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate, and blood oxygen level.
Sung and Shira "holding hands."
Visiting with Shira
July 11, 2007
Sung never went through labor, nor did her "water break". There was nothing physiologically normal with the delivery, since it was initiated by the obstetricians. Because of this, both Shira and Sung missed the normal "priming" that occurs during a normal, term delivery. Sung had to use a pump to stimulate breast milk production. At first she pumped and got nothing, which was very demoralizing. After about two days of pumping every 3 hours she produce a single drop of early milk, called colostrum. The nurses in the NICU called it "liquid gold", and they encouraged us to wick it up with a Q-tip and rub it inside of Shira's mouth. While probably not very helpful from a medical point of view it did provide encouragement for us to keep trying. By the time this photo was taken on July 12, Sung was already starting to produce modest amounts of milk, but it made us very happy. We simply "banked" it in a freezer since Shira was, at first, not taking anything by mouth and was simply receiving elemental nutritition through a peripheral IV line.
After about 72 hours, or 3 days, Shira was extubated (the breathing tube came out). She was no longer being ventilated by a machine.
Shira without her breathing tube. Now she is just getting some slight supplemental air flow through the prongs in her nose (nasal cannula).
Spending time with her was becoming easier once the breathing tube came out. Every time a tube or probe came out of, or off of, her body was a reason to celebrate.
Once the breathing tube came out Sung was able to finally hold Shira for the first time.
July 12, 2007
I held her for the first time the next day.
As is common with premature babies, Shira did eventually develop jaundice and required phototherapy (aka "the lights") for a few days.
Grandma Mija came out to visit.
