Update

A quick update on things:


F continues to learn how to feed, and is getting better at it all the time.  The cardiologists want her in at least one more night (at one point it looked like she might be coming home tonight), but given that we live so close to the Mater, it sounds like they might let her come home tomorrow.  That would be the second best Christmas present ever.  (Refer to the opening chapters of Matthew or Luke if in doubt about the best Christmas present ever).  There's possibly a little jaundice so she'll be under a uv blanket tonight to try and resolve that quickly.  They also said that we'll need to do some monitoring ourselves for the next month - just listening to the heartbeat a couple of times a day to make sure it's in sinus, not SVT.  Thankfully my sister is a cardiac nurse so she has a stethoscope we can borrow until the shops open after Christmas.


Petrina is doing marvelously.  She's off the heart medication now and had her own ECG today, which the adult cardiologists said looked fine.


When I was writing yesterday's post, I failed to mention how impressive and encouraging my wife is.  My job during contractions was to make fingers available for squeezing and to count until the peak had passed.  Easy enough, although Petrina didn't seem all that fussed about my offer to count in Fibonnaci numbers or prime numbers, just to keep things interesting.  But while I was doing that, she was living out our faith in a remarkable way, alternating between singing the old hymn "Abide with me" and praying openly and unashamedly for God to protect her, protect the baby, to make the drugs effective, everything.  I don't think anyone who'd been in the room would have left with any doubts at all about where Petrina's hope and trust is centred.


Here at home S and I are both looking forward to having our girls home soon.  Please keep praying that S will adapt quickly to having a baby in the house, and some of the changes that will come with that (like vastly reduced tolerance for racing through the sleepout at bath time laughing hysterically or choosing to shout at the top of his lungs at random moments when he feels things are too quiet).