NFP - Neonatal Follow UP

The state does a Neonatal Follow up program for infants that spend an extended period of time in the NICU and have special needs and attention. This Thursday it was Brinleigh's 3 month follow up. You go and meet with the different specialists to make sure all her needs are being met.

Her appointment was at 8:30 am.... Off we go.

First off we met with the RN: The basics - Get her down to a dry diaper....

Weight - 11 lbs 14 oz. (wahoo)

Height - 21.5 inches (yay)

I was dying laughing cause she totally peed all over when she was on the scale! She was swimming in it! Clean up in room 1. haha.... first station we were happy, she had gained 14 oz since her last appointment and grown! We will take it!

-Dietician

So from the time of leaving the nicu they would have liked to haved seen her gain at least 20, she was a little under she was at 19.5. Dang girl pretty good if you were to ask me! We went over her eating, or should I say drinking, haha, and she was happy with her progress! We had the little plateau about a month in a half back when taking out all her fortification, but since has picked back up and gaining really well! She is on a upward climb and nothing needed to be changed! Yay (cause you would be fighting me to change anything there)

-Audiologist

This one was pretty funny to me...

We met with the Audiologist next and she asks me, so do you have any concerns, my response was No, I think we are ok (while thinking Yes but we are working on it now... so no). She then proceeds to ask me the following questions.

1) "Does she react to your voice?" - Well, No

2) "Does she turn and look if she hears loud noises?" - No

3) "Did she have Menigitis?" No

4) "Did she have anything else like CMV?" Yes, she has CMV

5) "Why did they test for that?" -Cause her hearing loss.... "Wait WHAT?"

The lady had no clue Brinleigh was deaf! I then proceed to tell her that she has had two ABR's done and didn't pass either, and that's why they then tested her for CMV. She sees an audiologist, she has hearing aides. She then says well sounds like there isn't anything I can do. She just laughed and said I wondered how you weren't concered if you answered no to those questions. I said because I already know why. It was funny! :)

- Pediatrican

Next up the Pediatrican... at this point we had waited in between specialists for awhile, and Brinleigh had fallen asleep. The Dr says well I will let her sleep cause her next appointment she will have to perform... She then asks me to lay her down, I do, she then pulls out the (name ?) thing they test there reflexes with on her knee and knocks on her Brinleigh's knee, and BOOM the devil was awaken. Brinleigh screams, and she does so much that she has a lovely blue spell. The doctor then asks if this is normal... Well it was when she was in the hospital, but they have totally mellowed out. She only has them when she's extremely upset! Which you just took her by surprise and pissed her off! She then proceeded to say that sometimes heart problems can cause that, so we should follow up on that. Other than that things were good on that end.

-OT/PT

Next up the therapist! Brinleigh had fallen back to sleep after her "moment" and we waited a WHILE for this one, but it ended up being ok, cause she got a good nap in.

We enter and time to wake her up, I tell him I hope she does ok, she can be difficult when we wake her. Well she woke up happy as could be. He says you know I have 3 boys and kids are great at making us parents look like liars, I just laughed, it's so true. We then proceeded with her evaluation, he laid her on the floor and she did GREAT. She followed all the toys from side to side, she got excited when a new one was in her line of sight, she used both legs & arms. She brought her hands midline and to her mouth! She was right at the 3-4 month level! He did suggest more tummy time, to get her moving along in the right direction, and showed us a few other ways to do tummy time, that's one we will need to work on. He was really happy with her and what he saw! He also voted her the most adorable and Best dressed baby of the day!! ;-)

So overall, it seems like we are heading in the upward right direction!! Wahoo!