O2 Be Free

So big good news today. Clara no longer needs to be on oxygen!!! Last week we had a sleep study done and we received the results today. Clara averaged 93% on her oxygen saturation and only dipped to 88% or below 0.7% of the time. These numbers matched my expectations since I checked in on Clara frequently during the sleep study. I was a bit surprised that averaging only 93% was sufficient to take Clara off oxygen since it is on the low side of the targeted 92% to 97% range. Kristina was the one who talked to the Doc and he expressed that her overall numbers were actually quite good. So hooray!

Even though Clara had progressed to just needing oxygen at night and during naps this is still just a huge step for me. It’s ingrained in me that these girls are fragile, but I can’t express how good it feels to remove this reminder of how much we have endured. Admittedly, when Clara first came home on oxygen it was almost a badge of courage that the oxygen followed us around. Kristina and I had been through a lot and I would have traded Clara coming home oxygen free for the world. But that would have seemed a bit unfair. If Clara had come home oxygen free it would have felt odd that a passer by, or a visitor to our home, could look at our twins and have no notion that it hasn’t been easy for us. However, time has worn on and I think of Kristina’s hospitalization and the NICU struggles as distant memories and so it seems only natural now that Clara is off oxygen. At this point it would seem unfair to have that badge of courage, because the girls are happy and growing and progressing. With Clara’s cannula stickers removed from her head we now look and can start to feel like a normal family. Oh boy does that feel good.