Day 2

It's hard to believe that only two days ago the twins weren't here. I thought it would be easier to update here with what happens rather than trying to relay it all through email and text messages.
First of all I'd like to announce that babies names are, drum roll please........Joe (middle name to be confirmed) and Harry Jacob.
Joe is twin 1, the bigger of the two who arrived on 28th January at 8.03pm weighing 1lb 5oz, swiftly followed by his smaller, younger brother, Harry at 8.09pm weighing 1lb 3oz.
Being born at only 23 weeks 5 days gestation obviously makes them very premature indeed and they have been given only a 50/50 chance of survival.
Yesterday they were transferred to Portsmouth hospital, 50-60 miles away from home as our local NICU doesn't treat babies born under 27 weeks. Initially we had been told that they have accommodation available for parents who don't live locally, but apparently it's reserved for parents of critically ill babies so it looks like I will be doing the two hour round journey every day.
We travelled down as early as possible this morning to see them. Baby Joe is more stable than Harry at the moment. Joe is on a ventilator to help him breathe, but they have been able to turn the setting down and he isn't on any extra oxygen. Harry on the other hand is needing quite a bit of help in addition to ventilation. He needed a transfusion of blood and plasma over night, has been given a lot of fluid to keep him stable, has had problems with his blood pressure so is on medication for that, and his salt levels are too high. Just as we were leaving earlier he was having an x-ray to check his lungs as his blood gas levels had become very erratic. I am just waiting to hear the results - there was no answer on the phone when we tried just now. Both babies are under photo-therapy lights for jaundice.
We still haven't managed to take any pictures. Yesterday we didn't see much of them as they were working on them so much, and preparing them for transporting to their new home. Also we were a bit wary about the flash on the camera upsetting them. We took the camera today though, but the blue lights of the photo-therapy machine made it impossible to get a picture :(
We do have one really bad picture each of the them, taken by the nurse in Poole for us before they left, so I will scan it in at some point so it's here.
I just want to thank every one for there support and thoughts. I know there isn't much else anyone can do but we appreciate every single text, email, and phone call, even if we can't always respond straight away.