Appointment Day

We met with our lawyer this morning, and his suggestion was to serve my SS with papers naming my parents as guardians of Little Bit, giving them the ability to make medical decisions for her. Then once she's out of jail we will serve her with papers to terminate her parental rights (which will hopefully be signed voluntarily on her part). He said that it could take 9-12 months for the adoption to be finalized, but if my parents can get guardianship then they can make the determination to allow us to take Little Bit back to Baton Rouge.

This afternoon we took Little Bit to meet with the ID doc, and things are looking good...she's gained 1 lb 10 oz since my parents brought her home from the hospital on 9/17. She's still a little underweight, but she's in the 50th %tile in length and head circumferance.

The first 2 DNA HIV tests came back NEGATIVE (PRAISE THE LORD!!) She'll have another DNA HIV test next month, and then another at 4 months old, and if all 4 come back negative then she'll be deemed HIV negative. The antibody test came back positive, but that's not surprising since babies carry their mother's antibodies for 15-18 months. They will do another antibody test at 12 months, and if it still comes back positive after the 4 negative tests, then they will do it again at 15 months and again at 18 months.

The Hepatitis C test came back too low to tell if it's negative or positive. Apparently it can only be read at a certain level, and since it was below that level they can't tell whether it was positive or negative. So they'll try it again next month.

And her blood clotting test came back really high before she was discharged so they took some more blood today to see if the levels are decreasing.

I have to say that dealing with the county hospital system is quite a trip. Never in my whole life have I never been so blessed to have the insurance coverage that we have.

Thank you so much for your prayers!!! We were very pleased with what we learned at the doctor's appt today. And we're hoping that my SS will sign her termination papers as soon as she's out of jail so we can proceed with the adoption. If not, then it could be a long, drawn out process, but we believe that in the end we will end up with Little Bit b/c my SS has no place to live, she has no job, and she's a junkie.

We did get quite a laugh leaving the hospital today...we were getting in the car, and mom said that O had spit up on me. I looked down, and it was brown. It wasn't spit up...it was BIRD POOP!! I was so grossed out!! I was telling J to hand me a wipie and some antibacterial gel as it was running down my cleavage. YUCK!!! I would have GLADLY worn a spit up stain with great pride, but THAT stain I did NOT wear with pride. LOL