5 December

Guess who went on a trip today?  That's right, we moved to Special Care!

Let me explain in order.  Weight down a hair, perhaps because I had some spitups and a couple giant poops, but still over 5 pounds:

Mom and Dad came by in the afternoon just in time for my 5:30 changing and found me still breathing fine on my own without the cannula.

Dad unwrapped me to do my diaper and I got compliments from him and Mom on my stylish monkey outfit.  What can I say - I like clothes decorated with animals!

However when they opened my clothes to change my diaper that woke me up and I did my best to help by keeping my arms out of the way (actually I knew I had poop in my diaper and didn't want to get any on my sleeves, but figured it couldn't hurt to tell them I was doing it just to be helpful)

That latter one's me getting startled by Mom; I looked away for a minute and forgot she was standing there and then was surprised (though happy) to see her.  They said I reminded them of Grandma and Grandpa's narcoleptic forgetful cat Tigger who apparently would forget everything he ever knew about every fifteen minutes.  I never met him, so hard for me to say... wait, what was I talking about?  (get it?)

Oh, right, getting my diaper changed.  After it was done they swaddled me back up and I put on my stoic face....

...for the journey to Special Care.  Mom comforted me and let me know it would be okay and she would stay with me, which was nice since I'm not used to being wheeled more than about ten feet and here we were going on a fifteen minute ride!

Nurse Nancy took the lead and drove me over to Jackson (I had been in Perot) which is where Special Care is.  I got to go on TWO elevators which was exciting!

When we arrived in special care I found I had a fancy new wooden bed waiting for me so they got me situated in there, moved to the new bed (well, I stayed in my plastic crib but instead of being on a metal cart it's now on a wooden one), and hooked me up to the new monitors.  Check out the size of this room - I'm living the high life! 

After all that excitement I was ready to go back to bed, and was already asleep by the time Rory arrived - she's in the other half of the room but I have my own TV so that's good.

Anyhow, more from Special Care tomorrow but I need my beauty rest now!

4 December 2011

Hanging steady at over 5 pounds:

Parents visited separately today.  Dad came first, in the morning after church.  He found me sound asleep as usual, getting my 8:30 feeding through my tube:

However, when I started crying that woke me up.  Dad changed my diaper (it was wet) which made me feel better even though I still gave him my customary skeptical look.

Since I was being a bit fussy, the nurses suggested he take me out and hold me and I did - had visited with Mom last time I was awake so it was nice to have a chance to visit with Dad when my eyes were open for once!

Okay, so they weren't open the whole time, but they were for awhile before I fell asleep:

I woke up again briefly when he put me back in my crib so I could say goodbye, then passed out again.

Mom came by later in the day, and in what can only be described as some sort of miracle, I was awake AGAIN - that's right, TWICE in one day!  Moreover, I had been doing well on my breathing so they took out my nasal cannula (which I was pretty happy about - those tubes in my nose were getting annoying!)

I was a little sleepy but since Mom was there I took the opportunity to try out some new expressions I'd been working on.

Then I asked her what she thought.

She said they were cute but that I looked cold and should wear my hat.  Sheesh!  Moms, right?  But I let her put it on to humor her.

We had a good little visit there so it was a nice day getting to see both my parents.

3 December 2011

Weight up again!

That's right, 4 lb. 13.2 oz., not to shabby I think!

I was still in my dog-face hat when Mom and Dad came to visit for my 5:30 feeding, and since I was hiding (so no one would bother me while I was sleeping) it looked like I was just a hat in a bed:

(but I was actually in there)

When the time came, though, I was rested enough to wake up when Mom did my temperature and diaper, and wide awake for her to feed me.

I started with my usual, Kerins-family-in-photo-traditional giant confused-slash-crazy eyes....

... but once I realized it was just Mom settled down, and even gave her a little smile!

I took my bottle in an alternating series of big gulps and long pauses, and got about half of it taken before the nurse suggested that maybe I shouldn't take the whole thing since it was a lot for my stomach to take in that quickly (when I'm fed through my tube, the same feeding goes over 2 hours instead of twenty minutes with the bottle), and that the OT who had been there earlier in the day had intentionally only given me about half through the bottle.

So Mom agreed and stopped feeding me to burp me and, well, let's just say that when you take big gulps a lot of air gets in there, and sometimes when it comes out some milk comes out along with it.  I tried to get Mom's shirt but she was too quick for me and caught it with a spit-up rag.

I quickly turned on the charm - who can get mad at a face like this?  (she's smiling despite just being spit-up on, so you know it was working!)

She held me for about another half hour to let me visit, which was nice since I was wide awake so we actually got to look at each other the whole time.

Finally she put me back to bed...

... and swaddled me all up....

... and then her and Dad wished me good night and headed home for the night.  It was a nice day; I got three bottles and did pretty well with all of them, and had a nice, wide awake visit with Mom and Dad to boot.  Sweet dreams for me now, tomorrow's another big day!  Goal is to get up to 8 bottles per day so I can go home, keep your fingers crossed!

1-2 December

Got a little bit of catching up to do again, so let's get right to it.

On Thursday, December 1st, I was up to 4 lb. 12.9 oz., which continues a nice trend of increases over the past week.

I think it's also helped by the fact that I've gotten a LOT better with my spitups - no major ones for a couple days in a row now!

Dad came by in the morning.  I was asleep.

Since it was time for my feeding, though, he took me out to try bottle feeding me, and as soon as the milk hit my lips I was ready to go (I was hungry!) and started chowing down.

After about 12 ml, though, I slowed down and needed to be burped.  Dad got a good burp out of me, but (as usual) I decided it would be a lot of work to keep eating from the bottle, so asked if I could just have the rest of my feeding through the tube like normal (okay, to be perfectly honest, by "asked" I mean "refused to open my mouth so Dad couldn't get the bottle back in", but the net effect was the same).

Unfortunately for me, Nurse Sandy was there and showed Dad some tricks to make me open my mouth and start eating.  Foiled again! 

Once I realized I had been thwarted in my efforts for a tube feeding, I went ahead and finished the rest of the bottle so I could go back to sleep, but as you can see I was not too happy about the situation:

Mom came by in the evening and bottle-fed me again.  This time I did a little better and took over 20 ml without any coercion.

The next day, Friday December 2nd (can you believe I'm 7 weeks old already?!?) was a great day for me.  I put on a little more weight for starters, up another half ounce to 4 lb. 14.2 oz.!

Second, I did great with my feedings, taking my entire feeding via bottle twice today.  Go me!

Third, I put on a cute outfit (okay, Nurse Brittany put it on, but that's just semantics...).  It's a sleeper that says "Dad's best friend" and has a matching dog-face hat:

 

Is it the most manly thing?  Perhaps not.  But it certainly made me a fashion icon - all the nurses loved it when I was out for my 2:30 p.m. bottle, and I was wide awake soaking up the attention - I like being social when no one's disturbing me or trying to make me do any work!

Dad and Mom came by a couple hours later and found me exhausted from being awake for so long earlier.  Dad did my temperature and diaper and I helped as best as I could without waking up:

Since I had already done two full bottle feedings earlier in the day, they wanted to do the 5:30 feeding through my tube, but Dad still was able to take me out and hold me while I was eating.  I got nice and cozy, but am learning not to relax TOO much, and didn't have any bradys the whole time I was out!

We had a nice little visit - I even opened my eyes and looked at him for a little while before falling back asleep!  Mom didn't get to visit too much since she was feeding Rory, but had a chance to say hi once I was back in my crib afterward.

She thought my hat was really cute too.  What can I say - I'm a hit with the ladies!

Supposed to try moving up to three or four bottle feedings tomorrow so we'll see how that goes, but if all goes well they might start dropping my feeding times down a bit, since my tube feedings are still going over two hours to minimize spitups.  Keep your fingers crossed for me!