2 years since we brought you home

Last week we passed the second anniversary of your homecoming from hospital, two days after your due date.
I was simultaneously delighted to get you home and terrified because you’d only been tube and wire free for 2 days of the last 95. And I’d had almost no sleep the night before in the parent craft room. I think our first priority after getting you in the door was to make a large coffee.

You weighed 3.27kg, enormous compared to your original 855g. It was Friday and that night we said a special blessing to celebrate your survival and our first night at home together.

Happy 2nd unbirthday

Last weekend marked the second anniversary of Talia’s due date - June 20.  (She arrived March 20.)

It says a lot about how far she has come that I didn’t even think about it much in advance. Last year I felt quite emotional and made a cake.  This year things were pretty busy and then I looked at the calendar and it just dawned on me that this was the date.

So here she is 2 years ago - at “term” despite being 3 months old.  She gained loads of weight in hospital and was 3kg when this photo was taken.

And last year - 15 months old, 12 months corrected.  She struggled to gain weight after leaving hospital, and at her 1 year review was assessed as being delayed in all areas of her development.  (Still very cute though!)

And this year, 27 months old, 2 years corrected.  Her weight gain has improved, her development has caught up, and she is a delight.  We are very blessed.

She can talk the talk…

(Warning: contains serious mummy bragging!)

What an amazing difference a year makes.

At one corrected (15 months actual) last year, we thought she might possibly be trying to say “cat” - but it was neither clear (”tat”) nor consistent (”tat” sometimes referred to random non-catlike objects) so we weren’t sure.

As it turned out, she was trying to say cat.  Since then, her progress has been astounding.

This week we had her 2 year corrected review, and at 27 months of age her results are almost unbelievable.

Language development - 98th percentile for corrected age - 92nd percentile for chronological age, “representing a developmental age equivalent to 31 months for receptive communication and between 37 and 39 months for expressive language skills.”

Things she has said in the past week that made me stop and write them down I was so impressed:

- Oscar sitting on the chair, on the pillow
- There’s another little corn tin
- That’s pretty groovy
- No want Talia’s rocking horse at Mothers’ Group, no want Talia’s rocking horse with Talia’s friends
- Mum draw pink octopus like this octopus
- No want lying down
- No want talk to daddy
- There’s a beetle inside treasure box
- There’s a lizard up on the branch
- Mum washed Talia’s dog and bones ‘jamas
- That’s very good Talia

We have not only caught up with language, we’ve kissed the language delay goodbye and leap-frogged quite a few full-termer friends!

95 days later

Last night on a parenting forum I came across a post from the mother of a little boy who had been in hospital for 95 days - exactly the same length of time as Talia - and who had now just passed the milestone of having him home for 95 days.

It took me straight back to the same moment in my life, and I went and found the blog entry I wrote for the L’il Aussie Prems website at that time (my first blog post ever, before I had a website of my own).  Here it is.

95 days later

By Finisterre on September 29th, 2007

We celebrated a special family milestone this week: following 95 days in neonatal hospital care, our prematurely born daughter Talia passed her 95th day at home.

191 days before this milestone, I was a different person. Walking with blind faith through a seemingly ordinary first pregnancy, I knew nothing about prematurity, had never heard of CPAP or NEC or ROP, wouldn’t have known a bradycardia from the Brady Bunch, and had never experienced the indescribably gut-wrenching fear of losing a child almost before its life had properly begun.

Today I am the mother of a petite, smiling daughter who should only be three months old, not six. Looking back on the extra three months of daily hospital visits, I remember urging my little scrap of humanity to survive, anxiously checking for any gain in her weight, increase in her milk intake or improvement in her breathing, and I realise just how much further families of prem babies need to travel in order to arrive at the same place as families with healthy full term babies. It is an emotional journey on rough roads through strange territory, navigated via heart-rate and oxygen monitors, and not a few prayers. This neonatal landscape has changed us forever, left its shadow on our hearts, and opened our eyes to fears and wonders never before encountered.

After 95 long days, one journey finished and a new one began. We have been blessed twice over, both with the life of our child and with all we have experienced and learned about her incredible survival.

And here’s the munchkin at that age:

2 years old and moving up the charts!

Born: 0.855kg, 34cm long

1 yr: 7.235kg, 66cm long