Day 6 (Friday 19 November) marked the first day of both Chantelle and I operating out of Gordon’s Bay, meaning that for the first time we couldn’t just walk around the corner and say Hi to Jessie every five minutes!

After a nice shower, we confirmed that Chantelle’s outer wound is pretty much all healed up now already, and so with just the pain to deal with, Mommy has jumped straight to work on expressing some milk to take with for our dribble monster’s consumption.

In terms of the milk generation, Chantelle’s boobies are continuing to do a magnificent job, producing up to 70 ml after a 20 minute session, with this number increasing exponentially with each and every expressing session!

As for Daddy, I’m busy juggling as many balls up in the air as possible, taking care of the household chores, looking after Chantelle, working for Touchwork and of course acting as chauffeur for my incapacitated (in terms of driving) wife.

We visited Jessie in the afternoon, and the good news is that my little dribble monster’s heart condition is now resolved, with the hole successfully closing up after the medicine ran its course. The other good news is that they have upped the amount of milk they are feeding her, now giving her 1 ml every hour, though still via the tube that runs directly into her duodenum. Another plus is that her stomach content is showing signs of clearing up, so it shouldn’t be too long now before she can receive her nourishment via the correct channel. Oh, and we learned that CPAP shouldn’t be necessary for too much longer either.

I abandoned Mommy to do her sitting with Jessica on the chest thing, heading off down the street to go visit the two now great grandmothers and show them the pictures of little Jessica for the very first time. Needless to say, this caused great excitement and we ended up enjoying a long visit, just the two grannies and I.

Back at the hospital, I did manage to have Jessica pried off Chantelle’s chest and placed back in the incubator, before making the long trip home where I dutifully scolded Chantelle for not sleeping more during the day.

Chantelle touching Jessica's foot. The rules governing on how we can touch her are pretty fierce, mainly because at the moment, any wrong stimulation could be detrimental to Jessie's future growth. For example, no rubbing of her skin, no touching the bridge of her foot...

Still, day 6, successfully passed! :)