Yeah! It's Amelia!

Hello Everyone!
As most of you should know by now Amelia Sava Turrell was born on August 7, 2007 at 6:50am. She weighed 8 pounds 10.5 ounces at birth and was 20 inches long. Beautiful! Kim and I were very excited by her arrival and relieved that the labor process was over after 30 or so hours.

Within the first few hours after Amelia's birth we noticed that the skin on her hands and feet had begun to dry and crack. This dryness was soon on most of her little body. 24 hours later a dermatologist diagnosed Amelia as being a Collodian Baby. This term comes with many questions, as we soon found out. Kim and I created this page to help control the flow of information for our 'googling' friends and relatives. There is a lot of information out there about collodian babies, some of which is very scary, and most of which does not apply to Amelia. It is important to us that you all have the right information as it applies to Amelia specifically. We are making this effort in order to keep you informed, reduce your level of anxiety and stress that can come with information overload, and so that you can know specifically what to keep in your thoughts and prayers.

Collodian babys are born with an outer "membrane" of skin that gets very dry and tight in the air outside of mom's warm body. This dryness can become constricting around a baby's face and on other parts of their body, and it can also affect the fluid levels inside of a baby. Once a baby is diagnosed as being a collodian it is then important to be sure the skin remains moist and that the baby's fluids and minerals are at the right levels. For this reason Amelia was put into an incubator that also had a humidifier in it. In the first few hours after her diagnosis she was in the incubator for a period of time and then in our room for a period of time. This however wasn't the best treatment for her because the air outside her little dome was still too drying for her skin. Additionally, she had lost some fluids. So the docs decided to move the little bugger to the Neo-Natal Intensive Care Unit. This was not as serious as it sounds and many children have to go to the ICU to get fluids after birth. Amelia has been in the ICU since August 9. She is now in an incubator that can create an even more humidified environment and help her collodian membrane to do what it is supposed to do next. This process, as it relates specifically to Amelia, I will explain in the next post.

All the Best,
Ford