Day 50

Today marks day 50. 

Tomorrow Arabella will be exactly 35 weeks gestation (5 weeks away from being full term). 

She's still so very tiny. 

At 35 weeks, the weight of a baby in the womb should be around 5.25 pounds. Bella's sitting at 2.4 currently. 

She was growth restricted in the womb (IUGR) due to placental insufficiency, and now her PDA is stunting her growth outside of the womb. She's had to deal with many obstacles.

Parents of preemies will usually refer to their babies' corrected age. Since Belle was born 3 months early, when she is 4 months old her corrected age will be 1 month. You basically subtract the amount of weeks/months that she came out prematurely from her time since birth. In her case, we would subtract 3 months. 

So when she turns 1 year, her corrected age will be 9 months.

Arabella will likely be teeny-tiny until she catches up to her peers in a few years time. But no one really knows for sure. Sometimes I've heard of tiny preemies receiving growth hormones to help speed up the process if they lag too far behind. 

All of that is far, far away, though. It might not apply to our situation either, and once her PDA is finally closed, she'll eventually skyrocket in weight. 

A long road lies ahead.

This morning Belle had a kidney ultrasound so that doctors could take a close look again at the fungal deposits, and she also had a chest x-ray. 

Blood test (CRP) levels have significantly gone down so that proves that the antibiotics are working.

We're slowly moving ahead, step by step.