HOPPY Easter from the Bunch Bunnies!

Wishing you and yours a very HOPPY Easter from the Bunch Bunnies and their crazy parents! Seriously, we have left our newborn babies with no dignity...But my gosh, are they cute or WHAT?? :) Once again, a BIG thank you to Nurse Lori for allowing us to cause a fiasco in the NICU just for the sake of our photo addiction! And another thank you to Gramma Debi for the Easter Onesies, which, if you can't read them, say "Colton Bunny", "Hunter Bunny" and "Ethan Bunny." And finally, thank you to Paula H. for the Easter bunny ears! They could not have fit more perfectly! What a fun way to spend Easter! We love them!

Our first family picture EVER!

The Bunch Bunnies...Colton, Hunter, EthanCOLTON Bunny

ETHAN Bunny

HUNTER Bunny

Colton, Hunter & Ethan

And on to our 2nd outfits...Ethan, Hunter and Colton

Hunter lovin' on her yellow bunny! These photos were taken by their Nurse Lori, and given to Brian and me in an album as a surprise for our first Easter with Babies! She even got her this dress for the occasion! Thank you so much to Lori for this wonderful Easter Surprise!

Colton snuggling the bunny!

Ethan sleeping with the bunny!

Brian, Jen Borquez (Baxter), Anabelle and I decided to dye Easter Eggs! These are the eggs we made for the babies!

Brian is positively thrilled with his egg-dying skills...Umm, can we all please look at the next picture, of his green egg. Apparently, he just drew lines on it. Creative. Really. I'm so proud...

Life in the NICU :)

Well, our baby trio is currently 18 days old! Man alive! They grow up so fast.... hee hee. So how is life these days? Well let's just take a look..

As we go through each day, we realize how abnormal our lives are right now. I always think of the opening segment on Jon & Kate Plus 8 nowadays...."It's a crazy life...but it's our life." Yep! That kind of sums us up right now! We're making due though! Unfortunately Brian had to go back to work this week, which was very sad for all of us. We had a nice little routine going and then we had to adjust it.

So what does a regular day consist of right now with 3 babies living in the hospital 30 minutes away? Well it goes something like this....At about 8 am., Brian leaves for work. I'm up and awake (because I'm spending quality time with my breast pump, of course!) I get ready for the day and at about 10:00, I head for the hospital so that I can be there for the next round of feedings and diaperings, etc. (I of course, make sure to grab ALL the pumped milk I have in the fridge so that I can deliver lunch to my babies!)

So once I arrive at the hospital and search endlessly for a parking spot. I head up to the NICU. I arrive at the NICU entrance, wave to whomever is on duty at the front desk and they buzz us in! We go into the washroom, where I pretend momentarily that I am Meredith Gray on Grey's Anatomy, and I am scrubbing in for surgery. :) Then, after 3 minutes of handwashing, I go into the NICU. I say hello to the babies' nurse for the day, hand off the breastmilk and then say a quick hello to each of the babies (Who are usually sleeping).

The babies feedings and "cares" (diapering, temperature taking, etc.) are staggered by a half hour each. So right away, my routine begins with Hunter. (It always starts with Hunter.) I unswaddle her, say hello and then I take her temperature by sticking this probe in her armpit and holding her arm tight to her body so that it gets a good reading! (She is surprisingly strong..but then again, remember, her mommy is "freakishly strong" too.) We report her temperature to the nurse who records it on her chart. It's important that the babies maintain a certain body temperature, because this is a criteria for going home....Next, I unfasten the yucky diaper, move aside the wires attached to their chests, then clean up the old diaper and put on a new, teeny-tiny diaper! If her clothes are dirty, I put on a new outfit! The nurse listens to her heart and tummy sounds and then we get ready for lunch! Depending on what cues Hunter is showing us determines how she will get her lunch....through her feeding tube, from a bottle or from breastfeeding. (The feeding issue is another important one. Before the babies can go home, they need to be able to consistently eat their whole feeding through either a bottle or breast and be gaining weight. )At this point, I would hold her while she eats (or anyone who is visiting!). At 11:30, the same routine begins with Ethan and again for Colton at 12:00.

So once I make it through the whole cycle, I either stick around for the next set of cares and feedings which begin 3 hours after I started Hunter, or I go run errands. At nighttime, Brian and I both go back for the evening feedings. This is Brian's favorite time of the day because often, since he is working again, this is the only time he sees them. He absolutely LOVES being in charge of their feedings and cares and he does it so enthusiastically! The nurses have often mentioned how nice it is when we show up because we do so much on our own! So we usually head for the NICU in the evening at about 7:15 and we stay until around 10:45 or 11:00. It's nice to hang out with the nurses! Like I've mentioned before, UMC is just awesome! We've loved all our babies' nurses, though some we know better than others because they're there more often and some get our quirky sense of humor better than others which makes spending time there more fun!

So anyway, we get home from the NICU at about 11:30 at night, Brian goes to bed, I pump and then go to bed and it all starts over the next day! We're looking forward to the day when they can all come, (though I don't have that answer yet....)

So anyhoo, let's see what's new with these babies of ours!

Colton

*Colton currently weighs 4 lbs. 11 oz. (Chunky-Monkey!)

*He is still in his "Big Boy Bucket" and has been maintaining his temperature very well!

*He is still a cuddler and he just melts my heart with his big, dark eyes and his adorably quirky little smile!

*Right now he is perfecting his breast-feeding (while his mom perfects her technique as well!) God love one of the nurses, Carrie, who shall now & forever be my breastfeeding guru! She completely helped Colton and I figure out what was wrong one evening! It's very tricky for Colton to get a good seal because of his cleft and she was absolutely amazing in helping ME figure out what I could do to help him! Carrie, if you remembered to check the blog, WE LOVE YOU!! hee hee..Who knew, squeezing your boob on the sides as opposed to the top and bottom could make such a difference!!

*As for bottle feeding, this is my own personal nightmare at the moment and last night, it became Brian's too. We now understand the pain and frustration a parent feels when you know your child is miserable and there is nothing that can soothe them. Right now, we are trying to find the best way to bottle feed Colton. But again, his cleft makes it very difficult for him to form a good seal around a nipple and then be able to suck and swallow. Regular bottles don't necessarily work for him because they require Colton to put forth too much effort to suck. So we're trying to learn how to feed him with this very unique bottle and nipple (called the Haberman Nipple). There is a technique to using it. (And by technique, I mean there is an instruction booklet for using it.) That alone is frustrating! The other part is that we still can't get him to latch on to it. We've watched other people have mild success feeding him with it, but we've not been able to master it ourselves. And to add to the chaos, it seems every nurse was trained differently on how to use the Haberman nipple, so we're lacking some consistency there! Last night, the poor baby was crying with such utter frustration. He just wanted to eat and could not figure out how to do it! It was literally breaking our hearts to watch our baby look at us with his big eyes as if to say, "Mommy, Daddy, help me. I'm so hungry."

But I have no doubt he'll get it...

Everyone is doing great. Our babies are troopers and I'm so proud that they are "Feeders and Growers" and not in the NICU for anything more serious. You realize how precious life is when you spend your days and nights surrounded by the tiniest, most fragile babies in the hospital. We are blessed. :)

Keep your fingers crossed for the Bunchkins to come home soon!

A Baby Reunion!

TOGETHER AT LAST!

Left to Right: Colton, Hunter and Ethan

Thanks so much to Lori D., the babies' wonderful nurse, we finally got to "reunite" all three babies for the first time since their birth 12 days ago! Let me tell ya, I thought they were cute when they were all by themselves, but my heart just melted seeing them all together! It was the fastest photo session I've ever seen in my life! Between Lori, Brian and me, we each grabbed a baby, unplugged their wires, set them up for photo time and then quickly returned each baby to his or her crib! I LOVE IT!

All About Colton

Colton Samuel

*Currently weighs about 4 lbs. 5 oz. (was 4 lbs. 6 oz at birth)

*Never required a respirator

*No longer requires a CPAP mask or other oxygen source

*No longer requires IV fluids

*Required treatment under the Billirubin lights for about 4 days

*Currently maintains his own body temperature

*Was the first of the "Bunch" to graduate from his isolette/incubator into his "Big Boy Bucket"

*Receives his feedings through his feeding tube, but is also learning to breastfeed! He's doing remarkably well, even with the cleft. Go baby!

*Is the leader of the pack and shows his brother and sister what to do!

*Has a very distinct cry...something like a bird!

*Can produce the stinkiest, greenest surprises in his diaper!!

*Has the most beautiful big eyes and is extremely alert when he's awake!

*Loves to be held...

After our breastfeeding session, we thought we'd just hang out together...I love this little boy...

Colton and Mama

It really doesn't get any better than this

Before I graduated into my Big Boy Crib

Would you be happy with all these tubes in your face??

Like I said, he loves to be held....Daddy's little man

Colton in his Big Boy Bucket!

All About Hunter!

Hunter Olivia

*Currently weighs about 3 lbs. 2 oz. (she weighed that at birth, but lost several ounces and then went back up!)

* She is the tiny one of the Bunch Clan for sure!

*She required treatment under the Billirubin lights for just a few days.

* She never needed a respirator.

*No longer requires a CPAP mask (continuous positive air pressure) or any other oxygen.

*She has a PICC line inserted in her arm. (It's a fancy catheter that allows her to receive nutrients and such for a more extended period of time than a regular IV.) It's because she's so little.

*Her PICC line will likely come out on Monday April 6th. Hooray!

*She is still in her Isolette/Incubator but they're talking about moving her to her "Big Girl Bucket" very soon!

*She receives her food through her feeding tube, but is also learning how to breastfeed now! She is the most natural at it! (That's my girl!)

*She LOVES her feet! If they aren't swaddled, they are STRAIGHT up in the air!

*She has the most beautiful, big, bright eyes and when she's awake, she's SUPER alert!

*She loves to sleep

*She sounds like a mouse when she fusses. Brian calls her his "little squeak mouse."

This is Hunter with her Daddy

Do you see those big, bright, alert eyes??

These are my feet! I love my feet!

This picture makes me think of the song, "Daddy's Hands..." Practicing her movie star pose, while soaking up the rays of the Billirubin lights

Sleeping soundly....

All About Ethan!

Now that they're 12 days old, I thought I'd take a minute and share some info about each baby!

Ethan Bradley

*Currently weighs about 4 lbs. 2 oz. (was 3 lbs. 15 oz. at birth)

*He graduated on Day 11 out of his Isolette/Incubator and is now in a regular, open air crib! (Or as Brian calls it, "His Big Boy Bucket". :)

* He is maintaining his own body temperature now without assistance!

*Never needed a respirator!

*No longer requires his CPAP mask or oxygen in any form!

*Gets fed through a feeding tube that runs through his nose into his belly.

*Is starting to learn how to breastfeed! (He cracks me up when he attempts to latch on...he falls into what I would call the "licker" category.) He seems the slowest at picking up the whole concept but has already made great progress!

*He is a sleeper! A peaceful, angelic looking sleeper.

*Is very mild tempered and is not very fussy!

*Eats and poops very well!

*Has good hand control and uses his little bitty hands to hold his pacifier! (See pic below)

*Definitely looks like his mama!

Ethan holding his pacifier

He was sleeping contently while Gramma Daniels rocked him

"Hello world!" Looking all around him

For my first night in my "Big Boy Bucket" I got to wear a hat to help keep me warm!

This is his new crib!

C-sections and bodily functions :)

Aah yes, I know you're intrigued now...there's just nothing like a blog about bodily functions! And you had to know what with everything else we've been through, I'd totally talk about them for ALL the world to read! :) There is officially no modesty left in this new mommy!

So today officially marks the ONE WEEK BIRTHDAY of our three babies! Amazing...1 week old, and already I've taken somewhere in the neighborhood of 300 pictures...$55.00 to develop ALL of them....(even though half of them are the same exact pictures just a different day!) So let's see, if we average that, then we'll be looking at 1200 pictures and and $220 a month! Fantastic! That's almost as bad as formula or diapers!

COLTON

HUNTER
ETHAN
So anyway, the babies were born on Monday....on which day I had my stomach neatly cut open, beat up a little, then stuffed full of my stretchy uterus once again, and finally sewn back up! That part was not so bad...(anesthesia is a wonderful thing)....it's the days AFTER the first day that I thought something HAD to be wrong!! As anyone who has had one knows, they cause a lot of bleeding afterward and the searing pain in my stomach was enough to make me want to beat the nurses who insisted that "getting up and walking is the best thing you can do!" Are you kidding me?? I just had three babies ripped out of me and you want me to get up and WALK?? (ok, in all seriousness, I loved every one of my nurses and I know they really do know their stuff.) But allow me to be dramatic for just a minute....the only thing I had going for me was knowing that I had three tiny babies waiting for me upstairs in the NICU. There is no incentive like that to make you get out of bed and walk....and I'm not talking a hop, skip and a jump. Nope. Out of my room, down one hallway, through the double doors, down a longer hallway, onto the elevators, up to the 8th floor, back down another long hallway, turn the corner, and finally, we're at the NICU! (Oh yeah, and then back the other way to go back to my room! ) Anyway, I'm still glad I had a C-section and I'm simply enjoying the fact that my belly is once again small enough that I can actually almost SEE my incision which, now that the staples are removed and pieces of surgical tape are in their places, it looks like the Cheshire Cat smiling up at me!

So that's the C-section....with surgery, and with being hospitalized comes a new found sense of publicity about things people typically don't converse about...namely, those numerous bodily functions we all do secretly and blame on other people. And that's what so unique about a hospital. It is the only place that the nurses and doctors cheer for you when your successfully resume one or all of these functions! But it doesn't come easy you know....

Let's start with peeing and bleeding:

Two topics that in my opinion, don't necessarily belong together. Fortunately, I spent the first 2 days and nights with a catheter which allowed me to sleep peacefully through the night without having to get up and waddle in severe pain to the bathroom. LOVE THE CATHETER. I never thought I'd see the day when those words left my mouth...But soon enough, the bliss has to come to an end. They actually want to see if I can pee on my own again! And they want to know how MUCH pee I can produce! Which means that for 48 hours, I have to actually tell someone every time I go pee! "That's a conversation that gets old fast..." God bless the nurses and patient care techs who had to come in and measure my pee bowl that, let's be honest, was no lovely shade of yellow...Oh no! With it comes all the insides of my uterus which turns that pretty yellow pee into a red bowl of nasty. Sorry to be so graphic, but inquiring minds need to know this stuff!! Anyway, let's top off this conversation by saying that for 48 hours, I successfully produced good pee! The nurses were pleased with my progress! Go me!

But let's move on to the Bowel Movements, the BM, if you will.

First of all, you know me too well by now to know that I refuse to refer to that specific function as a BM OR a Bowel Movement until I at least qualify for a senior citizens discount at the movies. So let's just call it what it is. Poop. Fortunately, no one was QUITE as interested in my poop as they were my pee. They would ask about whether or not I had pooped each day, and I unfortunately had to say no. The fact that they were giving me Colase (stool softener) each day should have been a clue that accomplishing this task was likely going to be no easy feat. And in fact, that blessed event did not happen until I was released from the hospital and had been in the comforts of my own home for a day and a half! But don't you worry, when it finally happened, I danced my way into the bedroom where Brian was trying to take a nap, and announced (as I danced) that I was doing the poopy dance! Woo hoo! And just like the nurses in the hospital, he actually cheered for me! He should really win a prize or something.

Moving on...let's talk about Gas.

Not the gas we see at every corner. No no. GAS. The kind we all do, secretly, and either blame it on others or simply act as though it never happened. See the following passage below, from Wikipedia.... :)

According to the The Alphabet of Manliness, the assigning of blame for farting is part of a ritual of behaviour. This involves deception and a back and forth rhyming game including phrases such as:
* He who observed it served it.
* He who first detected it ejected it.
* He who said the rhyme did the crime.
* Whoever spoke last set off the blast.
* The next person who speaks is the person who reeks.[17]

Yes. This is the bodily function that EVERYONE seemed most interested in. How fascinating! Predominately because it was the one that was contributing MOST to my internal pain. Aside from having a giant stretchy uterus flopping around in my gut, there was also a GREAT deal of gas. And that bothered me, because trust me, it's unlike me to NOT be able to "release" it. But for whatever reason, I think my body was under so much stress from everyone asking if I'd "passed any gas" that it simply couldn't. Call it stage fright. Call it what you want. I could not fart. It wasn't for lack of trying either...three separate doctors actually tried to encourage me to get rid of the gas by assuming what they referred to as the Islamic Praying Position. You know, on your knees, butt in the air, arms stretched out in front of you so that the highest part of your body is in fact, your butt. (Gas rises, you know) :) So anyway, I figured I ought to give it a try...

There, trying to encourage me every step of the way of course, is my loving, gassy husband who has ZERO problems releasing his. He'd walk around the room, releasing audible toots and then turn to me and say, "And that's how it's done." Seriously. It didn't matter if we were in bed trying to sleep, walking to the cafeteria, watching TV, you name it. It became the mantra of the week...."And that's how it's done." Well, try as I might, I was unsuccessful for the first 4 days. Until finally, one night (actually in the wee hours of the morning, something like 3 a.m., there we slept soundly until the moment I felt a gurgle....I can't even describe my excitement at this point. And sure enough, in the dark comforts of my hospital room bed, I Ami Bunch, mother of triplets, farted. Out loud. Not even knowing whether Brian was awake or not, I excitedly, (but quietly ..it is 3 a.m. after all) utter the words I'd waited so long to say, "And that's how it's done..." To which I hear, "That's my girl!" And so that's how that story goes....I think I lost about 5 pounds that morning and I was feeling good!

Finally, I'll leave you with a "look ahead" to another post...Breast Pumping. :) A topic I believe deserves its own entry. So for now, I hope you enjoyed my real life account of bodily functions in a hospital! And just remember, if you should ever go down that road and YOU need to pass some gas, just remember the praying position. It's a god-send. :)