grateful

So, newborns? They’re a handful. I was thinking to myself this morning, my gosh, I STILL have no time, two weeks later, even though we aren’t in the NICU as we were with Calder and are no longer housed in the peds unit with Beckett. And then I realized that this was still not a normal baby experience. Maybe there is no such thing for anyone as a “normal” baby experience? I'll hold off on running down the list but we have had a hefty number of doctor appointments in the last couple weeks, more than the average bear (where does that idiom come from? Oh, wrong use.) Given the push to put Beckett on formula immediately following birth due to concern about his blood sugar levels and thus his familiarity with a bottle, as well as his prematurity, nursing has been put on hold, and I’m back to being chummy with my old friend the pump. When Beckett expresses hunger, I start with nursing, always a challenge, and then move to a bottle, and then pumping. Between doctor visits, feeding Beckett and any nap I can catch (given I’m up all night), there isn’t a lot of free time. Such is the life of a new mom!

In terms of where Beckett stands medically, we think we’re in a good spot but will have some follow-up appointments with specialists as we did for Calder. Before we left Inova Children's, even though his hearing had been tested at GW, they informed us they wanted to test it again using even more in-depth testing, because one of the antibiotics they'd had him on for the last four days has a tendency to cause hearing loss. They had failed to mention this when putting him on it ('scuse me?!), so  you can imagine we weren't thrilled; fortunately, everything looks good, but the woman who tested him allowed that it could be months before we see any effect, so we will certainly want to have him tested again at one year, as Calder was. We were finally discharged on Thursday, so pretty much spent a week in the hospital. Because of his low temperature, which resolved after a course of antibiotics, and UTI (based on the growth in his urine sample), they decided it would be prudent to run a renal ultrasound. The US showed that he has some fluid (urine) pooling in his kidney on one side, causing the kidney to swell -- the condition is called hydronephrosis -- so they are sending us to the radiologist for a voiding cystourethrogram (VCUG). There can be a couple different causes for hydronephrosis, so what we see with the radiologist will determine next steps.

Yesterday we attended the NICU reunion, sponsored by Fairfax Neonatal Associates ... maybe also March of Dimes, and some others, I think. I was impressed; they really went all out. We were out of town for the reunion last year, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. It was so sweet how they celebrated these kids. They had superhero capes and masks for all the little kids, cake galore, ice cream popsicles, punch with straw cups (exactly Calder’s style), a musician, craft tables, a photo booth and more. We said hello to our doctors, who I respect so much, and who last week I almost called directly on several occasions and still wish I had early on, just for peace of mind. It was so good to see them. Dr Baker took one look at Beckett and asked how old he was gestationally, and when he was born. When I gave him the quick run-down of our past couple of weeks, he raised his eyebrows. “We wouldn’t have discharged him so quickly. Any babies less than 36 weeks are automatically sent to the NICU, because inevitably, they experience issues within a few days of birth.” Of course, in our case, he was spot on. Kraemer chatted with Dr North for some time about the new hospital being built, but Dr North was mostly interested in Calder, getting his memory refreshed on all the challenges Calder faced while in the NICU and how he was getting along now. We missed a few others who had been on Calder-duty, like Dr Baveja and Dr Doe, so guess we’ll have to hope to see them next year! We also missed tons of our nurses, but we were lucky to get a visit from one while we were still in peds with Beckett (thanks, Laura!) I will never forget what these folks did for us and for Calder.