7 Weeks

7 Weeks - 3 lbs, 6 oz

Here is Jacob's 7 wk photo from Friday.  He is getting bigger and it really shows.

Jacob is still making slow and steady progress.  Getting much better on his percent oxygen required.  All weekend he was at a steady rate in the mid-twenties.  He was at 24% today, vs room air of 21%, so his oxygen is very low!  We are so thankful for the progress - he was in the 30s all week, the 40s last week, and the 60s when he first came off the ventilator a couple weeks ago.

He is still having some periodic apnea spells where his oxygen saturation falls and heart rate falls - 3 last night but none today.  His doctor says the spells are not as much due to struggling lungs since he is doing so well on breathing and oxygen the rest of the time (good news, that type of spells could set him back), but more due to the brain just forgetting to breathe (due to prematurity).  He can grow out of this as he develops.  After all, he is not supposed to be breathing yet - his due date was not until after Christmas.  

His high flow oxygen is still at a high rate of 6.0 liters per minute but I am guessing the doctors will start to lower this since he is lower on oxygen percent and having fewer spells.  When he weans to a lower rate and grows out of the spells, we can start holding him and bathing him.

So we are looking forward to a new week of progress, and thankful that we did not have the setback we feared earlier this week.  As always we are thankful for all the prayers and for our faithful friends and family who supported us during the lows of the last week.