2.24.2009

Update and Pics

Today Show update: According to the producer, we'll be on a live shot @ 6:17am AZ time. So I assume that means 7:17am CST.

Here is another NICU update. All babies are off photo therapy and breathing on their own with a little supplemental oxygen through nasal prongs. All babies are either on full feeds or will be today which means that they may be getting their IVs out very soon. We have been so enjoying getting to hold and love on each one.

Sloan - 3lbs 1oz
Rocco - 3lbs
Madden - 2lbs 15oz
Jagger - 2lbs 14oz

We did learn that Rocco has a moderate PDA, which is common in premature infants. A PDA may close on its own or it may have to be treated with a medicine called Indomethacin or it could also be treated by surgery. Of course, closing on its own would be the best because there are potential negative side effects of the medicine. Last night, Rocco showed some symptoms of an infection so he had labs drawn and tests run to find out if he has one. So far, the results look as though he does NOT have an infection and that the symptoms (cold, heavy breathing, intolerable feeding) may just be symptoms of the PDA. Since these symptoms are showing up now, the docs have decided to go ahead with the medicine instead of waiting to see if it will close on its own. Please pray for Rocco and his little heart. Please pray that the medicine will do what it is supposed to and his PDA will close and he will not experience any negative side effects. They will perform an echo tomorrow night and we should know if the medicine helped or not.

Sorry we have not been very good at posting pics. I hope you enjoy these.



P.S. We are supposed to be on the Today Show tomorrow morning. I will be talking to the producer again today to get all the details and I will post later tonight and pass along the information.

Love,
Kami

2.21.2009

"D" Day - What Really Happened?

It's kind of a blur, but I will do my best. I believe Nick was keeping you up to speed the day or say leading up to "D" day...but just for a recap...on Tuesday(10th) during routine ultrasound, Dr. Hill found that baby D (Jagger) had a heart deceleration. This led to constant monitoring of him for the next 48 hours. Dr. E took me to the OR just in case on Tuesday afternoon only to send me back to my room 3 hours later. I was put on a very high dosage of mag on Tuesday and monitored for my contractions (along with baby D). Mom and Nick spent the night with me Tuesday night.

On Wednesday, we found out about baby D's reverse blood flow. As the day went on and the mag was heavy in my system, the contractions I was having which were causing his decels, started slowing down. Things started looking better Wednesday afternoon. Nick went back to the condo to shower. At 8:45 pm, mom called Nick and told him he better make his way back to the hospital because my contractions were picking up. Around 10pm, we had lots of activity in our room. Dr. Elliott was on his way to the hospital. Nurses started prepping me for surgery and the anesthesiologist came in and spoke to me. I told Nick that "this is it!" I didn't think Dr. Elliott was driving in for nothing and I definitely didn't think he would send me back to my room from the OR a second time.

During all this, my momma was a nervous wreck. She knew that they would only allow one person back in the OR with me and that she would have to wait by herself for any news. We wanted her to be back there with us...especially after all she has sacrificed and been there for, but rules are rules and we didn't know how to get around them. God had another plan. The nurse manager, Lee, came over and told mom that she was a rule breaker and that she could scrub in for the surgery! What a blessing...momma said she will be forever grateful to Lee...as will I! Another special person was my nurse for that shift, Joy. This was the first time I had her, but God definitely put her there that night for a reason. Joy was awesome! She came in and prayed with me, momma, and Nick before we were taken to the OR! Thanks Joy!

This is Joy. I debated on whether posting these pics...for obvious reasons, but I just wanted you to see what "magged out" really is! Yuck!

"Mag Smag!" LOL

When Dr. Elliott got to the hospital, he reviewed my monitoring strip. He came in and stood by my bedside and told us that it was not time yet. After all that! But we were glad of course, the longer the babies could stay in the better...so we thought! He told the nurse to increase my mag for the contractions, and give me morphine and ambien so I could get a good night's sleep. So they did and we turned the lights off and the three of us were off to bed for the night! About an hour and a half later (12am), everyone burst into the room and said this was it! The contractions hadn't slowed down and baby D had to come. Dr. Elliott had stayed at the hospital so he was still there. Dr. Hill was on call that night so she was available as well. As you can imagine with the medicine I was on, I was pretty out of it. However, it had been a prayer of ours that the surgery wouldn't be an emergency section where I would be knocked out with general anesthesia so that I could be awake for their arrival. Another answered prayer!


Dr. Elliott watching my contractions and baby D.

Well, I was rolled to the OR and you know the rest of the story! Our beautiful babies were welcomed into the world at 12:52, 53, 54 and 55 am. I think they were as "magged out" as their mother, but they did well and are doing even better today! Dr. Elliott said just another 20 minutes in utero and Jagger may have sustained serious injuries. So even though I had more fighting weeks in me, my little man didn't and he had to come! I will be forever grateful to Dr. Hill for detecting the decel on Tuesday morning and being cautious enough to bring it to Dr. Elliott's attention...she has been so awesome and will always hold a special place in our hearts. I will also be forever grateful to Dr. Elliott for making the decision to move when he did and saving our little man's life...he too will hold a special place in our hearts. We prayed for our doctors all along and the decisions they would be making....so this is no coincidence to me! Every aspect of this journey to me was nothing short of miraculous! My God is so good!

There are so many people that were part of the delivery. I wish I knew everyone who had a part so I can personally thank them. From the bottom of our hearts, thanks for being there and giving us the best care. We are so blessed and will never forget that night!

Here is the edited video footage of the delivery.


Love,
Kami

What are Girlfriends For?

***This was the update I was about to finish and post last Tuesday before all the baby drama started! Thought I would share it with you now!

They showed me this weekend. I had four of my closest friends fly here all the way from home just for a short weekend visit! What a surprise! After last weekend and now this weekend, I have the best family & friends!


(Left to Right: Tiffany, Casey, me, Laura and Ashley)





They were able to shop, see the town, eat out, but mostly they just visited me in my room. On Saturday, they surprised me with lunch and cupcakes from Sprinkles (ooohhh...sooo good!)and gifts! We even played that "guess the size of my belly" shower game. I loved every minute of it!

Thanks alot Ashley! You lose!

Momma even enjoyed the girls' company!


On Sunday before they headed to the airport, they stopped in to say goodbye. They were able to be there for my daily ultrasound and pet therapy.

Girls with Nietzsche!

Dr. Strong doing daily ultrasound

To Laura, Ashley, Casey & Tiffany - thank you for an awesome weekend. There's just something about laughs that you share with your girlfriends that are different than laughing with anyone else! To my other friends that wanted to come but just couldn't make it work - you were definitely here in spirit...I felt the love!

Kami

2.16.2009

NICU Update

Wow! I can't believe its been 4 days already (almost five)! This experience has been the most emotional, incredible, amazing...I could go on forever! We are so truly grateful for all the support, prayers, comments and love we have been receiving over the last few days. Please don't hold it against us if we haven't responded to your texts or emails yet but know that they are very much appreciated and needed!

We promise to bring you the story leading up to delivery but we wanted to get updates out on our kids first. ALL four of them are breathing on their own!!

Sloan:
Sloan is only feeding through her IV at this point. She is stable but does have CPAP (continuous poisitive airway presssure) to supply some extra oxygen which they are trying to slowly wean her off of. She's also doing photo therapy for her billirubin count. Her current weight today is 2 lbs 10 ozs, just 2 ozs under her birth weight. Kami got to do kangaroo care with her for an hour this morning and I got to change her diaper. I was also able to be part of her first bath on Saturday.

Rocco:
Rocco is eating through a feeding tube with the breast milk that Kami is supplying. He is stable but is also on CPAP and doing photo therapy. Sunday he got a PICC line so they wouldn't have to poke my little man anymore. The nurse said he may be able to get off the photo therapy today or tomorrow. His current weight is 2 lbs 6 ozs which is down a little from his birth weight. I got to change his diaper yesterday.

Madden:
Madden is also eating through his feeding tube. As of today, he is only breathing room air, no CPAP. The nurses are planning to give him a little caffeine for any apnea spells he may have which is common for preemies. He's also on photo therapy. His current weight is 2 lbs 7 ozs which was his birth weight. Kami was able to do an hour of kangaroo care with him last night. I got to change his diaper on Saturday.

Jagger:
Jagger is also eating through his feeding tube. He is breathing on his own but with supplemental oxygen via nasal prongs. He's on photo therapy but should be off in the next day or so. He was on antiboitics for 48 hours as a preventative measure (but is no longer on them). Yesterday he changed rooms so that he's next door to his big brother Rocco. His current weight is 2lbs 6ozs which is up 1 oz from his birth weight.

As I mentioned, Rocco and Jagger and the only siblings that are next to each other in the NICU right now. The staff has assured us that everyone will be close together soon. Since this is all new to Kami and I, it is a little overwhelming to get updates on each baby as we go from room-to-room. The staff at Phoenix Children's is awesome and has no problem answering our questions no matter how many times we ask them.

Kami's blood pressure is still high and they're giving her medicine to try to lower it. Even so, we're expecting her to be discharged tomorrow and continue the medicine for a few weeks. She is getting around better but is not getting to goto the NICU as much as she'd like.

Here are some of our specific prayer needs:
- Kami's blood pressure
- babies will stay free of infection
- babies will continue to gain weight
- babies will continue to develop as they should
- our ability to process all the information

We've heard about the media attention we've been getting in Arizona and at home in Baton Rouge. We hope the story of our little miracles is blessing everyone as much as they are a blessing to us!

Love,
Nick and Kami

2.13.2009

Our babies first pics

Just a quick post - Kami is still on medicine (mag) for her preeclampsia so she's not able to get up and around much. Until I can do a more thorough post, here are the babies' pics - we are loving them and they're doing awesome!


Sloan Olivia


Rocco Dean


Madden Jax


Jagger Cole

2.12.2009

Happy Birthday Little Lambes!

Our sweet, little babies are here!!! Their birthday is 2/12 and here are some quick stats:

Sloan Olivia Lambe: born at 12:52am, 2 lbs 11 ozs, 16.5 inches long

Rocco Dean Lambe: born at 12:53am, 2 lbs 9 ozs, 15.5 inches long

Madden Jax Lambe: born at 12:54am, 2 lbs 7 ozs, 15.4 inches long

Jagger Cole Lambe: born at 12:55am, 2 lbs 5 ozs, 14.6 inches long

We'll provide more info and post pictures as soon as we can. Mom and babies are all doing good! Of course we're biased but it's a neat little story - our babies were definately born according to God's timing!

Kami and I cannot stop smiling!! We've waited for this day a long time! Thanks so much for all the prayers!

Love,
Mommy and Daddy

2.11.2009

As the world turns...

Kami's contractions are still only about 1 or 2 an hour. She's still feeling better than early this morning, but still not 100% by any means. She is still on mag and the terb pump.

Earlier today Kami had a Doppler ultrasound done on the babies. Several hours later Dr Elliott reviewed those results and discussed them with us. A Doppler u/s measures the blood flow through the umbilical cord to the placenta. The results were that Babies A, B and C have normal bloodflows. Baby D (Jagger) has a reversed bloodflow that only effects him when Kami has a contraction - this is the cause of the decceleration that was discovered yesterday. Even though Babies B, C and D share the same placenta, only Baby D is having a problem at this time. He is not in any immediate danger so Dr Elliott has chosen to continue monitoring Baby D's heartrate around the clock. Also Baby D will have a daily Doppler ultrasound as another step in monitoring. Dr E says that he has seen a reversed bloodflow cease but there is nothing they can do to make this happen. Basically that means we could deliver tomorrow, or we can still make our goal of 34 weeks. It is truly day-to-day at this point in our journey.

Please pray that Baby's D issue will be corrected and that our babies will be delivered in God's timing.

Wednesday morning update

NOON UPDATE: Dr Hill came in and now they are monitoring Babies D and A. Good news is Kami has only had 1 contraction in the past hour!! She's also feeling a little better since they've lowered the mag.

The mag has started to settle in a little more on Kami. She is very groggy since the meds act as a strong muscle relaxer. She is still in good spirits and cracks a joke occasionally. She got sick and threw up a little around midnight but they gave her something for the nausea and she hasn't been sick since.

Drs Hill and Elliott stopped by this morning after reviewing Kami's charts from last night. All signs are good so far but still very touch-and-go. As of this morning, Kami's contractions have spread out to about 1 every 10 minutes. She does feel the contractions now - tightening in her belly and shortness or breath, but they are not painful. They are continuing to monitor several things via hookups, blood/urine tests, etc.

Dr E decreased her mag to 2.5 about 10am this morning. They've also decided to monitor 2 babies at a time just to make sure they're all doing ok. Currently they're monitoring Babies C and D and will do A and B later. The babies heartrates are down a little but that is to be expected since they're feeling some of effects of the mag as well.

I'll try to keep everyone up to date as much as possible. As always, we thank you all so much for the prayers! I've been saying prayers aloud with Kami and I can tell it makes her feel better.

- Nick

2.10.2009

Update on Kami

While doing a routine ultrasound this morning, our resident doctor noticed a decellerated heartbeat on Baby D. She called in Dr Elliott and they decided to put Baby D on a monitor for an hour to see if it would continue or if maybe it was just a random thing. Not long after that hour passed, things started to move fast. Kami was given another steroid shot (her first one was about 3 weeks ago) and the doctors started her on magnesium sulfate and terbutaline in efforts to reduce contractions. Dr E also wanted to get Kami down to the operation room in case things progressed and they needed to move fast. I also had to scrub-in in case they decided to deliver.

After about 3 hours in the OR, Baby D's heartrate began to stabilize and Dr E made the call that Kami could go back to her room. He told us this was the first time he's sent a mom with quads to the OR and been able to send them back without delivering! We attribute that to the many prayer chains that were started on our behalf. Praise the Lord!

Kami is still feeling good and is in good spirts considering. She has been poked and prodded most of the day - but she's still joking. She's on a very high dose of Mag - 4.5 mg. The highest dose that is considered safe is 5 mg and none of the nurses can remember a patient being on that high of a dose in a long time. Baby D is doing good but Kami continues to have contractions pretty regularly. Please pray that these contractions will stop.

The nurses have taken some blood tests for her preeclampsia, levels of mag in her system and a few others I can't remember. The results should be in sometime tonight and should be very beneficial in diagnosing Kami and telling us if she can hold out a little longer before delivery. Kami's mom and I will be staying in her room tonight in case things turn.

Again I want to thank everyone for your prayers! We know that God has already got all of this planned out so we just continue to ask Him to show us His will. We also pray for our doctors and the decisions they must make. Most of all I'm praying for safety for Kami and our 4 babies!

- Nick

Kami is back in her room

As some of you may know, Kami had to go into the OR today. This is just a quick note to say that she is back in her regular room now. I'll post the details later tonight. Thank you all for the prayers!!

- Nick

2.09.2009

Growth Ultrasound Update

It has been 3 weeks since our last growth ultrasound so we were anxious to get this one and see how are little ones have grown. After about 2 1/2 hours of laying on the bed...changing positions, we learned the babies' new measurements:

Baby A (Sloan) - 2 lbs 15 ozs
Baby B - 2 lbs 13 ozs
Baby C - 2 lbs 5 ozs
Baby D - 2 lbs 11 ozs

That's 10 lbs 12 ozs of babies! I am 29 weeks and 1 day today so we have alot more growing to do before we get to our new goal of 34 weeks (March 15th)! Also, all the babies scored 8/8 on their BPPs! We are so grateful for your prayers and we know that the Lord is protecting and keeping our babies safe! His love is so amazing.

P.S. I do not have any news about the Today Show yet, but I will keep you posted.

P.P.S. I had a surprise visit from home this weekend...stay tuned for that post!

Love,

Kami

2.05.2009

The Today Show

Quick update: The Today Show has bumped us from tomorrow until one day next week. They warned us that this could happen. Apparently, they have an interview with someone really important that will take our segment...probably someone like Jared from Subway...we just can't compete with that! We do not know which day it will be next week but will keep you posted.

Love,
Kami

2.03.2009

Reunited!

Nick is here for good! He arrived safe and sound Saturday evening. I am so thankful he gets to be here for the duration of the pregnancy. It has been my prayer that I wouldn't deliver before he got here....for obvious reasons and also that he wouldn't miss the birth of his precious babies. Since he has been here, he has been able to see two BPP's, both of which the babies passed! He was amazed at how big they have grown in just a month.

I missed you Nick!

He's checking out the belly!

Also this past weekend, my brother, Travis and my sister-in-law, Sissy, along with some very close friends of ours, Jeff and Heather, came all the way from BR to visit! It was so nice to visit with them and I am glad they had a good weekend here in Arizona. On Friday, they got to the hospital just in time to see the daily ultrasound. It is always so fun to watch someone see our little miracles on the screen for the first time! Thank y'all for coming....y'all are the best!

Left to Right: Travis, Sissy, big mama, Heather & Jeff

Daily ultrasound - something was funny!


Hospital update: Babies are all doing great...kicking, moving, passing tests! I am doing fine as well. Hydrotherapy seems to be working...my swellling in my legs and feet are down alot. I am on a very low dose of blood pressure medicine which is keeping it stable. I am still able to eat which is great for the babies. They told me I would get to a point where I wouldn't feel like eating anymore, well not yet...go figure! The FFN was done today and came back negative! Again, this is a predictor that I will not go into preterm labor within the next 2 weeks (90% reliabiltiy). Of course, we are still praying that the preeclampsia will not progress and the babies will continue to thrive in utero!

On a side note, there is a good chance we will be interviewed on the Today Show on Friday morning. It is supposed to be a segment on families that come from out of state for Dr. Elliott and his associates and the Banner Good Samaritan Hospital. I'm sorry I don't have all the details, but I will try to post before Friday morning to let you know for certain if we will be on! Stay tuned!

P.S. Please pray for another quad mom here, Sharmeen Musani (sp?). She is 34 weeks along and she is scheduled to deliver her babies tomorrow around 1:30. She has made it so far...way to go Sharmeen! We will continue to pray for healthy surgery and babies!

Love,
Kami

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