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Parents of quadruplets celebrate two-week milestone
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Ayden - photo by COURTESY PHOTO

Megan Nemnich Fyler and Brandon Fyler welcomed four new additions to their family a little over two weeks ago. Four boys, Ayden, Braxton, Cameron and Dexter, were born on Feb. 23, five days after reaching their goal of making it to 30 weeks gestation. All four were born naturally, with an entire room filled with nurses and doctors on hand to receive each tiny baby.
Now, the family of seven, including two year old Colton Fyler, are doing well, and the four boys are beginning grow and become more and more capable of living outside in the world. They have been moved off ventilators to CPAP machines, and finally, all but one has begun to breath without assistance. Dexter, the tiniest of all, was quickly catching up to his brothers as of March 8, and the family anticipates him coming off the machine in the next few days.
Already, each boy is displaying their individual personalities, Megan reports. Ayden is a wiggler, Braxton is calm, Cameron is the one that tries to escape out of the bottom of his bed, and Dexter is sleepy, and working on catching up.
At last report, all but Cameron were no longer being fed by IV, and they anticipate he will be up to speed soon too.
Megan spent precious minutes during a pumping session last week to catch the world up on how the family is doing. She starts her days around 8:30 a.m. and finishes up around 9:30 p.m. Days are spent pumping, feeding and holding each baby skin-to-skin, eating, and resting before starting the whole cycle over again. Early on, the babies were fed through IV, then through a syringe. They are slowly being introduced to both breast and bottle, but it will be a while before they are strong enough to feed themselves.
Meanwhile, nurses and doctors in the NICU fuss over the four Fyler boys, monitoring their vitals, checking their growth. While they each lost a few ounces during the first few days, that’s beginning to turn around now.
With babies this little, progress is measured in grams, not ounces. Megan said on average, each boy is gaining 10 to 60 grams a day. Good news was anticipated for Dexter on Thursday with the possibility he could be taken off his ventilator finally. As of Thursday, he is the last boy to be on a ventilator, the others having moved on to the CPAP machines to assist them with breathing.
Brandon, the boys’ dad, took a week off following the birth of the boys. He is fortunate, Megan said, and was able to work at his company’s Wichita office the final weeks leading up to the birth. Now he’s back to work, splitting his time between home and Wichita, spending weekends with her and the boys.
And big brother Colton is spending the week at Grandma and Grandpa’s house, returning to Wichita on the weekend to visit mom and brothers until everyone can come home. Megan said they will remain in Wichita until at least the middle of April. The boys’ due date was April 30, but they are doing so well, there is a chance they could be able to go home a little early. And that will bring the next set of challenges, one of many to be sure.