The Krill Family

Tweaker:

Screamer:

Sleeper:

Sometimes I forget just how small Amalea is, yet people always comment on how small and cute she is. The other day I put her down on the couch (I’m learning that I don’t always have to be holding and cuddling with her) and stepped back and realized just how small she is. What an adorable baby girl we have!

Robin and I keep our own individual blogs. We have both posted some things on being a parent / dealing with life now. Check them out if you haven’t:

Robin: robinkrill.blogspot.com
Jim: jimkrill.blogspot.com

After the doctor Saturday Jim had some cuddle time with Amalea. On Thursday I got her dressed and then we met Jim to go to the doctor and lunch so I put her in a onesie with a great message!

Watching Amalea as they poke her and strap her down has made the last two days a little rough for me. I understand that all the poking is necessary, but still when she is screaming and they are taping down her head it’s really hard for me to just watch and not pick her up. I’ve cried a lot these last two days as I think about this gift we’ve been given and all the trauma she has already had to endure in only 20 days of life. I pray it won’t come to surgery, and yet I attempt to trust God’s desire.
The brain scan went well today and the doctors didn’t find anything that alarmed them. They were trying to find out if there was something going on with her brain (bleeding, tumors, etc.) that might be causing the bleeding behind her eye. This still doesn’t answer why she is bleeding, but it does rule out a few very scary possibilities. We will go in on Monday and she will get blood work done.
After being strapped down for the brain scan Amalea had a huge barf session at the hospital. It was actually pretty funny because she made a huge puddle on the floor – almost as if she was telling the hospital what she thought about everything she had been through – and then she slept. She is very worn out.
I had a cute picture of her cuddling with Jim, but it’s not letting me post it right now so I’ll add it later.

It’s Robin’s birthday today… but we’re off to Kaiser Woodland Hills again. Our Pediatrician called and set up a CT scan for Amalea, so Radiology is waiting for us. We are not sure how serious this all is… but we may know more after today. Please be praying… we’ll keep you posted.

It’s 11:20pm. Robin has gone to bed because she is exhausted, and rightly so. She feeds Amalea almost every 2 hours… and in between Amalea just seems fussy a lot of the time, mostly at night. And so I take her and try to get her to sleep. We walk around the house a billion times, rock in the rocking chair, I sing her stupid little songs I make up, I stand and cradle her and rock her back and forth; and on and on she cries. What the hell am I suppose to do?

See the problem, a lot of the time, is that she is hungry. And I can’t do anything about that. We are trying to solely breastfeed, so we are trying to stay away from formula, which means when Amalea is hungry, she needs mommy. So how am I, as dad, suppose to help my wife, mom, when she is dead tired, her body is soar, and she just needs sleep – but Amalea is hungry?

I find this so frustrating… that there is NOTHING I can do to calm her down… I feel so worthless.

But alas, I am sitting here typing in Amalea’s blog…and Amalea is silent, almost asleep. Ok, so I put her in the swing… the one with the fishes and the light that changes colors and the 5 different sounds… I chose rain tonight, and it worked. Like a drug it worked. Which freaks me out… but you get to a point… where you’ll try anything… even an artificial mechanical swing.

After a hellish visit to the eye doctor in Woodland Hills, we learned that Amalea has some hemorrhaging in the back of her eyes, and on one side it is bleeding pretty bad that they are worried about it. We will give three weeks to see if it goes away naturally, but if it doesn’t – she may have to go to UCLA to have Surgery.

Hopefully it won’t come to that. But if they don’t take care of it, her vision in that eye will suffer.

Please pray. Not that God would make her perfect, but that he would get us through these hard things. It’s hard on Amalea for sure, but it’s hard on us too, to have to watch her suffer.

We’ll keep you all updated.

Amalea sort of passed her two week check-up. She has gained back the weight she lost, and is now 7 pounds 9 ounces. She is eating well and definitely going to the bathroom well… The only problem at the doctor was that there was something going on with her left eye. The doctor shines a light into their eyes to see if it bounces back, and the left side wasn’t bouncing very well. The doctor said she doesn’t really know why, and she is sending us to a Pediatrician Eye Doctor next week to get it checked out.

Hopefully all is well with little Rayne’s eyes… but who knows, maybe we’ll have a pirate daughter with a patch over one eye! Poor little thing, hopefully she is ok.