No room...

Emerson told B&W yesterday that they were full and to check back on Thursday. None of this is working out like I had planned...

Tommy and Nate were upgraded from the class 3 ICU to a class 2 today. We had hoped that would also mean a change in hospitals, but so far that isn't working out... They are both 2 oz. above their birthweights as of last evening...

Next stop Emerson!

The boys are doing well, although the parents are getting tired and cranky. If you call us and I bite your head off, please don't take offense. It's been a long week, and we've seen more than we ever wanted to see. Both are now a little above their birth weights.




Thomas is up to 3lbs., 6oz. while Nathan is still trying to break the 3lb. barrier at 2lbs., 15.97oz. Actually, that is 10 grams higher than his birth mass.

Nathan seemed a little low on his blood Oxygen levels today, so they put the little nasal tubes that even adults get to deliver O2. Once they did that, however, his levels went right up even before they turn the oxygen on. Oh, well...


Thomas's heart kept wanting to act like a grownup's heart and slow down to around 75 today. That was because he was snuggled in and sooo comfortable on Jennifer's chest today during Kangaroo care.

They no longer require level three intensive care and we hope they can be transferred to Emerson Hospital in Concord ASAP. They have a level two NICU and it is much closer to home and only 15 minutes from work. We stopped there last night for a tour and it sounds so much more calm. While they might forget to breathe of their heart skips a beat or two, they are basicly healthy premature babies who need to grow.




What they and their parents don't need is any more drama. In the last email I mentioned that there had
been triplets born and two of them ended up on either side of Nate. Jen and I even felt like our guys were
being ignored a little Thursday night because of them. Well, one of them was conspicuously gone Friday.
Hoping that he had just been moved was silly. Leave it to the five year old brother of the triplets to
tell the nurse and the rest of the room that he had three brothers, but one was dead. The Mom never even
made it down to the NICU to see the little guy named Kevin. The Dad never seems to shed a tear and still
is proud of having two sons, but I did as soon as I heard that five year old.






Then I offered a little
prayer of thanks that my guys are going to be OK.

Mom is home but misses her babies...

Jen got home last night. It seems almost cruel to send a mom home without her babies.She handled it very well though.

The boys are improving. Tommy has been off his CPAP (the the thing on Nathan's nose) for a couple of days now, an Nathan will probably come off it today. They both maintained their weight yesterday, so hopefully everything will be on the up and up...

Pics 04/05

Too tired for words. Sorry.













-m

Couple pics of Thomas...

Tommy did pretty well today. Jen was able to hold him for over an hour. Nathan started to improve tonight to the point that he was going to be fed for the first time. He is a little behind his brother, but he is pretty typical for a 31 week premie...

Have to got to bed now...

-Matt

Early arrival of Thomas Paul and Nathan Gordon Rider

We have two baby boys who seem to have broken the the Rider tradition of always being late in that they arrived two months early today.

Thomas Paul was delivered at 11:24AM weighing in at 3lbs.,5oz.

Nathan Gordon was delivered at 11:25AM weighing in at 2lbs 15oz.

While the boys are in the NICU at Brigham and Women's in Boston, they seem to be doing better than expected for babies at 7 months.

Jennifer is doing very well and is in room 832.

Matt is thunderstruck and already badly lacking sleep. He should go to bed now.

Love Matt and Jen and Tommy and Nate

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz