Maddy's Second Day

Our little fighter continues to amaze us as she's still doing so so well. (I'm a proud papa, no one can tell right?) As you can see from the pictures, Maddy got to meet her Mom for the first time yesterday and it was love at first sight. Kristen also got to feed her a little of her breastmilk and she even changed her first diaper!

Maddy's condition remains stable. We totally expected this but she did have to be intubated yesterday. The intubation is to provide her lungs with surfactant which helps make it easier for her lungs to do their job. Given that the line is already in there, she'll probably start getting weened off today or tomorrow. She successfully got a pick line yesterday so she's no longer getting her fluids through the cord and assuming it was placed correctly, she'll have that there for a month.

Maddy's First Day

Very happy to report that Maddy's first day went relatively smoothly. She is on nasal oxygen support but hasn't needed to be intubated yet. She cleared one of her hurdles this morning with the ultrasound of her brain coming back without any blood issues which is very good news. 

Aside from all of the less fun medical details, I spent some time in the NICU last night and they let me know that we've got a little fighter. She had been crying pretty loudly and kicking around which is also a relief. Her official measurements are 880 kg in weight and 37 cm in length. 

Kristen is recovering well from the surgery and once they figured out the right pain meds, she's been able to rest easy and a lot of the complications from the pregnancy are already starting to fade away. Because of the medications, she hasn't been able to see Maddy yet but finally she'll be able to go in a few hours and I can't wait for us to be together as a family for the first time.

All of the prayers have worked and I'm so thankful to everyone for their continued support.

Introducing Madeline Grace Eschleman

Very proud to announce the arrival of our lil miracle, Madeline Grace Eschleman. 

She was born this morning at around 10 AM weighing in at 1 pound, 15 ounces via C section. Kristen is recovering nicely and I couldn't be prouder of her. Madeline will be in the NICU until about mid-May under constant observation as she develops.

I'll continue to keep this updated as she progresses in her early adventure.

2/26 Update AM

We made it through the night without any complications and the baby's still on her way. Probably at least another 5-6 hours to seeing Madeline.

2/25 Update

Last night, there were unfortunately a lot of complications with the baby and Kristen. For the moment, everybody is fine but the doctors have decided today is the day.

She was induced for a regular delivery at about 10 AM this morning and they've said that it would be about 24-36 hours to delivery after that point. If there are any complications for Kristen or the baby, she'll undergo a C section. 

I've been relaying all of the messages to Kristen and thanks to everybody for the continued support.

Keep us in your prayers and next post will be about the birth of Madeline Grace Eschleman.

2/23 Update

Maddy and Kristen continue to be stable and she's getting a few more allowances from the doctors like being able to leave the floor to go on hospital walking adventures. FREEEEEEEEEEEDOM!

While we'd love to be going home, given the nature of preeclampsia, at this point, it's pretty certain that we're going to be in the hospital for the duration which reminds me...

Kristen is at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center in room 2315.

The address is:
836 W Wellington Ave
Chicago, IL 60657

As a side note, I've heard from a few of you that you've tried commenting and it hasn't worked. The missing piece is that you need to sign up for a blogger account in order to post any comments. Your existing Google account will work but it's a couple extra screens to navigate through. I didn't think it was going to be so tricky to get through but I'm going to leave the site here to avoid any confusion.

Thanks again to everybody for the prayers and well wishes!

2/22 Update

Heard from the doctors this morning.

Maddy and Kristen continue to be stable and she's going to stay at least the weekend under hospital observation. K's blasting through some Revenge on DVD and if anybody has movies/tv shows she should check out on Netflix, post em in the comments sections. We're probably going to be here for awhile.

Thanks for all of your prayers and well wishes. They are much appreciated!

Intro

So we got the news this week that we may be seeing our new baby girl Madeline a little earlier than expected so Kristen and I have decided to start up a blog as an easy way to keep everyone informed on how the baby and baby momma are doing.

A few days ago, Kristen was diagnosed with mild preeclampsia and is now on bed rest for the duration of the pregnancy. We've been in the hospital since Tuesday and ideally, we'll get to go home at some point soon but our 3 possible outcomes for the moment are home bed rest, hospital bed rest, and delivery. We're 27 weeks into the pregnancy so the baby could be delivered now but obviously, every day she stays inside K, the better.

As of today, Kristen and the baby are still very healthy and doing great. We thought we might be a little closer to going home but they caught something on the tests that mean we're here for a few more days of monitoring. No cause for alarm but just the doctors being very diligent. As an unexpected perk of the situation, we got to see Madeline yesterday and just like her other ultrasounds, she was an absolute pistol. She was having none of the ultrasound wand kicking back at it and decided to stick her tiny tongue out at us. 

Next steps for us are continuous monitoring in the hospital and hopefully we'll get to go home at the end of the weekend. I'm going to try and keep this updated daily while we're in the hospital and throughout.

Kristen & Will