The many faces of OBE

 I apologize if our blog seems to be one-track minded recently. That's probably because my life feels singly-focused right now, on getting this little guy to thrive. So far, it seems to be working.

We had a doctor's appointment with our pediatrician on Monday, and Oliver weighed in at 5 lbs 14 oz. Then, on Friday, it was back to the hospital for a follow-up visit with the neonatal doctors (part of what they call their "Graduate clinic"--they track NICU babies to see how they're doing and to identify any early intervention). They gave Oliver a clean bill of health, said he looked great (the doctor was particularly complimentary of his "round" head--like his sister, Oliver has a particularly long skull, which means he never sleeps with his head straight back, but always turned to one side or the other). And this time, he weighed in at 6 lbs 6 oz. Just in time for his 39 week milestone, he finally weighs as much as a term baby (albeit a little one). Dan thinks we should have a party  next Saturday for his "due date." We'll see.

He's also been awake a lot more this week, which means we got a few pictures of him with his eyes actually open. He alternates between being adorable and having that funny old man face that newborns have.

Andrew has been a big help--he's willing to hold the baby and sometimes even help give the baby a bottle. The other night, while we were working on dinner, he read a story to Oliver (which was so cute that I didn't have the heart to tell him that Oliver wouldn't understand the story yet).

Andrew seems to be enjoying first grade (mostly lunch and recess), although he complains that the girls chase him at recess (!).

Evelyn is still at home with the baby and me, waiting for her preschool to start in a week or so. We did get to meet her new teacher this week, and I think she'll enjoy it. In the meantime, she gives the baby lots of kisses on the top of his head, and she got to help me give him a bath while everyone else was at school/work.

Dan had his first full week back at work this week. I don't think he enjoys the meetings, but I imagine it's nice to have grown-up conversations sometimes! I think that's one of the few things I will miss about not teaching this fall.

Baby, baby, baby

Andrew started first grade this week (on Thursday). The house has been strangely (okay, not so strangely) quiet without him, although he's made up for it when he gets home. It usually takes all of 30 seconds for him to start into his favorite pasttime--Evelyn baiting. (Unfortunately, Evelyn's not as big a fan of this game).

I think he likes school, although so far his favorite things are recess and school lunch. He was up late the night before school started worrying about just about everything: how lunch would work, if he'd make friends, if the girls would chase him at recess (seriously!). After two days, I think most of the worries have subsided, but he told me today that he still worries because he's away from his family so long. A sweet sentiment, but I think he'll get used to his new schedule pretty quick. I think it's just that, coming on top of the total disruption of his summer, it's been a lot of change for my change-resistant boy.

And of course, in a total parenting fail, I have no pictures from his first day of school. (Dan walked him to school while I was feeding the baby; and by the time I remembered when Andrew got home, he'd already spilled food on his new clothes). I do, however, have pictures of the robot costume his Dad helped him make (after Andrew broke Evelyn's scissors trying to cut out the arm holes himself).

 I think we're slowly adjusting to life with a newborn (38 weeks last Saturday!). We turned off Oliver's oxygen on Thursday and so far he's done great--every once in a while when he's deep asleep his stats slip just a little. We're hoping that when we go to the doctor tomorrow, she'll tell us we can get rid of the oxygen and monitor.

In other Oliver news, we took him to get weighed on Tuesday. A week ago Monday, he weighed 4 lbs 12 oz. Last Tuesday, his weight was up to 5 lbs 10 oz! So he's clearly getting enough to eat. He's almost up to regular newborn size.

This picture is really blurry, but I love it because of the look on Evelyn's face. She looks like she wants to eat him or something.

She's also not entirely clear on the concept of how to hold him. Look at the face here--I think she looks like her daddy with this expression. (It's the same face Dan pulls frequently for pictures).

 

Oliver was officially two months old on Thursday. So of course I had to take pictures to document it. I've seen other parents of preemies do this--take pictures of their kids with a stuffed animal so that, as the kid grows, you can track their progress relative to the size of the toy. So here's Oliver. For context, this is one of those baby Eeyore dolls you can get at Disneyland.

 

Poor kid. Mommy was having too much fun posing him.

 These next two pictures are a little blurry--I turned off the flash because it kept startling Oliver (and the pictures kept looking washed out). But here's a closeup of my baby.

 

 

 

Oliver reminds me a lot of a couple other babies I've known. Clearly, Dan and I breed true to some kind of mold.

Here's Andrew as a newborn. Look familiar?

 

And here's Evelyn. I'd forgotten what fat, round cheeks she had! I think Oliver looks more like Andrew than Evelyn, but there's clearly a family resemblance.

37 weeks and counting

Oliver would now be considered "full term"--but in that irony of preemie babies, he'll actually be two months old this week. Weird.

People keep asking how we're doing. The short answer? We're good.

The slightly longer answer: I think we're going through the honeymoon period with the baby. Mostly he eats, then sleeps some more. He's not ever awake for very long (except, of course, at 3 a.m. when I can't get him to give up that elusive burp and he won't sleep until it comes out). It helps, of course, that Dan has been home this last week to help with kids and to let me sleep a little extra in the mornings to compensate for getting up multiple times during the night to feed the baby. Ask me again when he has to go back to work!

We even managed to get out a little this week: Dan and I alternated taking the kids to the aquatic center. Andrew also had a couple of soccer games this week. So far (3 games in), his team has yet to win a game, but at least they're trying. (It didn't help, in one of their games, that the other team was mostly 2nd graders and Andrew's team is all 1st graders with one kindergartner. That one year meant that the other team had a good 2 inches on them in height, and, correspondingly, ran a lot faster.)

A Big Week

This has been a busy week. Obviously, we had a big homecoming this week. (Here are some long-over-due pictures).

This first was taken while we were still in the hospital. Evelyn loves her brother--she's particularly fascinated about the technical workings of breast-feeding. I'm still waiting for her to start nursing her dolly, like Andrew did when she was born.

 Oliver in the car on the way home. He looks slightly demented, but I think that's what happens when you still don't have full control of your motor skills.

 My first and my newest babies. Andrew looks like such a big-kid here--or maybe it's just the contrast with his tiny brother.

This is a face that we see a lot of when Oliver's awake. The big eyes, wrinkled brow and fierce concentration. Of course, he's only awake for a few minutes at a time, so we have to treasure it when we can. (Oliver gets a few bottles of high-calorie milk, enhanced by high calorie formula, each day to help him gain a little weight. As of Friday, at his follow-up visit with the pediatrician, he hadn't gained any weight for four days--had, in fact, lost weight, so we're trying to make sure he gets all the calories he can right now).

I got to have one last hurrah before we took Oliver home. My mom bought tickets to Aladdin at Tuacahn quite some time ago for herself, me, Evelyn, and my niece. Originally, the tickets were for sometime in June--and then Oliver was born and it wasn't feasible for me to go (I think it was the day after I got out of the hospital), so she rescheduled. And wouldn't you know it, we got caught by Monsoon season. With 6 acts left in the second half, we got rained out. However, the girls enjoyed what they did see. I thought it was fun--but the version at Disney's California Adventure is better.

The full scoop

I know my posting has been a little sparse this summer and I apologize for that. We've also been deliberately vague about the baby, largely at the advice of our doctors, while the baby was still in the hospital.

But--we have good news! Oliver has more or less mastered this eating thing (he got his feeding tube out on Monday) and he is coming home today (Thursday). He is almost 36 weeks gestational age; he's been in the hospital for 47 days. After his 3 lb 4 oz birthweight, he now weighs 4 lbs 11 oz.

We've been blessed to have good doctors and diligent nurses who have watched Oliver and encouraged us. (With a process this long, it's hard not to feel occasionally discouraged).

Mostly, we're grateful that our baby is here and that he seems to be doing well. This wasn't necessarily a guarantee. The day he was born, I had a placental abruption (you can look it up if you want--it's kind of scary and I'm glad I didn't know that much about it before it happened!). This can have serious consequences, not only for the baby (one statistic I read said that 20% of the babies died in serious cases, as mine was), but also for the mother, who risks hemorrhaging (coma and death are not uncommon). Oliver was born with a 1 on the Apgar scale (for a heartbeat). One of the nurses who was there at his birth held up a sheet of paper yesterday and told me that was Oliver's color when he came out.

And yet, as the doctor who delivered him (and today, signed discharge papers) told us, Oliver clearly had guardian angels watching over him. He bounced back quickly after his traumatic birth, with none of the side-effects that can happen after that kind of trauma. And of course, the fact that we were not at home when all this happened, but in a larger town 45 minutes away with access to a bigger hospital (and NICU), also seems like a kind of miracle. As does the fact that we came directly to the labor and delivery hospital, instead of going to the ER (which is located in a separate building about 10 blocks away). The doctors told us that had we gone to the ER, and had to wait there for a team to arrive from labor and delivery, we might have lost our baby.

So today, the fact that we get to go home earlier than expected seems like something to celebrate. I know that we're facing several weeks (if not months) of fractured sleep, but I'm looking forward to having my family together again.