Across the state Doctor visits

We have visited 3 doctors in 3 cities in Montana in the last 7 days - but they all had good results!
On September 16 we drove to Butte to visit the eye doctor for a follow up check. The eye exam was much easier than usual as the Dr. was able to just look into their eyes instead of prying them open. The results were that both girls' eyes are nice and clear! They are both still far sighted as normal newborns should be, so that is good too. We get 4 months before the next exam (which puts us driving over the pass to Butte in the middle of January.

Then Wednesday the girls had a weigh in at their pediatrician's office in Bozeman. They both gained, but Evie is extending the gap between them. Don't worry, we have an excuse for Maggie in the next paragraph. Evie is up to 9lbs and Maggie at 7.5 lbs. Go girls!

Finally, On Monday September 22, we visited the pediatric cardiologist in Billings. It should be recorded that we were 22 minutes early for the appointment - and if you know me - that is amazing. I forgot that it was Billings and apparently no one arrives that early at the hospital as there was no traffic and the parking lot was empty. I understood Oma's concern about parking when we left at 10am as there wasn't a spot left in the parking lot. Oh, but back to the appointment. We flew threw the first 20 minutes - Maggie even had an EKG with lots of little stickers that looked like puzzle pieces. I'm not sure what that showed, as Joe doesn't have experience reading those (not something we learned in the NICU) and it must have been pretty normal. When the doctor finally arrived in the office around 9:15 am (one of the reasons I don't arrive early to appointments), he did her exam and said it was pretty boring/normal. He didn't hear a murmur either. Then he did her echo cardiogram and verified that her ductus (patent ductus arteriosis) had closed, but she still has a moderate to large sized ASD (atrial septal defect). And when he measured the ASD, it was 0.8 cm - which seems large to me even. Luckily, it isn't really causing her any problems except she is working a bit harder and thus burning more calories and not gaining weight quite as fast. She will eventually have it closed, but hopefully we can hold out until she is big enough to do the surgery via catheter instead of open heart. The Doctor said sometime between the ages of 4-6, but he said the catheter was an option after she was at least 5 kg. Things that would cause us to close it early would be if she has problems with lower respiratory infections (pneumonia) or is not regularly gaining weight. So, the story is get her to grow and we'll take care of it when we need to.