Salmon Parr Update!

Alright - so obviously a LOT has happened since our previous post. We obviously didn't bake the babies as long as we had like to... So many of you are wondering what the heck happened between the last post and now.

So what happened? Well, long story short - we didn't make it. On Friday my body succumbed to the preeclampsia and we had to deliver the babies. Some of you might be wondering what exactly preeclampsia is, so click on the link for a brief overview... but the long story short is that my body became poisonous - my blood pressure was at toxic levels and I became at risk for seizures or strokes, and eventually my blood work came back and my other organs were at risk of shutting down. So we were no longer allowed to carry the girls. All this to say, it was a very quick turn of events on Friday. One moment I was fine, then next moment I was throwing up, with a horrible headache, and was just feeling the effects of my body going poisoned. Honestly, it was the most sick I have ever been and have never felt so awful... but we have SO much to be thankful for. You could see the hand of God through every circumstance, one brief example of this was that at 3pm when I took a turn for the worse, our close friend and doula Marisa walked through my hospital room door and was able to stay with me until they took me back for surgery. She was such a comfort and blessing during such a scary time.

Once we realized that our 31 week old babies would be coming that night, we were transferred to a dif. hospital due to lack of room in our hospital's NICU. So I took a nice ambulance ride over to UNC (yuck) and delivered our girls via emergency c-section there at 11:18 and 11:20pm. As soon as my placenta was removed, the disease was cured. It's the only cure. After having thrown up through a c-section... I felt a ton better after delivering. Sadly, I was still at risk for seizures so I had to go on some nasty drugs for the next 24 hrs. and although I no longer had severe preeclampsia, i still had very high blood pressure for the following days. We were on a roller coaster of keeping my BP down all the while our girls were kept in NICU and I wasn't allowed to see them when my BP was high. I didn't get to hold our girls until 7pm the following night after they were born.

It was the most amazing feeling to be able to touch them and hold them!!!

The girls were born at 3 lbs. 11 oz each and it was obvious that the steroids we had been given earlier that week had worked well on their tiny lungs!!! Felicity wasn't on oxygen for long and Noel is still on it but barely. They are doing really well for their gestational age and we are SO blessed, but they have a long road of growth until they can come home to us.

We all had a really good day on Sunday as I got to hold them BOTH at the same time. :)

My BP started acting up and eventually we had to go back to maintaining my health which limited my time spent with the girls. :( So that was hard and has been a hard balancing act... but time spent with the girls is so precious and seems to actually help my BP go down.

All that to say, the last few days have been a roller coaster ride, but we have been able to kangaroo care for the kids and it's something we'll continue to do to get them up to par and help get my milk in. :)

As you can see, my swollen face was back from BP and crying... but I was a happy momma at this point.

The game plan for now is to grow these babies and get them healthy and home. This means I'll be spending the majority of my day by my girls' sides in the NICU - which I'm so ready to do. I hate it when I have to leave them - it really is the worse emotional torture ever.

This also means we aren't taking visitors until we can get the girls home (which will be a while). We have been SO blessed with amazing family and friends who are so willing to support us during this time! In order to keep my BP down (I'm still at risk for strokes/seizures) and be able to dedicate all of my healthy time to feeding and caring for the babies, we cannot have guests. Although we hate that we can't show them off quite yet, we'll keep you posted on the blog, facebook, twitter, and instagram. :) They are TOO cute to not share. And once we're home and everyone's healthy and stable, we'll gladly open up the floodgates for visitors again. :) No worries though, we have family here who are taking great care of us. Check out these happy family members & happy babies!