Big Big Boy!!

I’m still a little down in the dumps today. I feel terrible for allowing my first ‘baby’ to get so hurt. Smokey is still doing well. We took him some wet food last night and they say that he is eating and drinking very well.

After running late this morning I ran out of the house with my camera instead of my cellphone. Thankfully Dean noticed and called on Ryan for us this morning. When I got a chance to call mom she gave me some of the BEST news!  Ryan had a VERY impressive weight gain yesterday!! He now weighs 1990 grams!!

 

 

He is now in a BIG BOY bed!! He made the transition to an open crib this morning!!

I’m am sooo excited and proud of our little boy!! He has now made the weight requirement to come home. We just need many prayers for his breathing and eating so that he can come home before Christmas!

 

 

I was able to feed him after work last night. Even after the crummiest of days this little face can put me in the best of moods!

Ryan listened to his first Christmas special while we were visiting him tonight!

He was even nice enough to Gain More weight tonight. He weighed in at 2020 grams! That’s 4lbs 7oz!!!

Exhausted!!

Ryan has a fairly decent night. He is still breathing too fast at times. He weighed in at 1920 last night. That is 4lbs 6oz!

I got Smokey to the vet first thing this morning. The doctors are going to keep him wrapped up and want him to stay with them for the next few days so that he will remain still and calm. They won’t unwrap his bandages until Thurs or Friday.

I’m completely exhausted. I did manage to spend a little bit of time with Ryan today. He was a very happy baby. I won’t lie I needed that today!

I was able to feed him a tiny bit of a bottle. He has been having very bad gas lately and instead of being constipated he has been having frequent loose stools. His doctor decreased his calories to help his tummy rest. Hopefully this will help him grow in spite the decreased calories since he doesn’t have to use as much energy with his tummy troubles.

Hopefully he will get his eating and breathing to a better place. I just pray that he is home by Christmas.

Good Day. . .Gone Bad

Wow, today was a wonderful day! We began the day by decorating for Christmas!!! Dean even got in the spirit and helped me with the outside decorations!He even picked out our roof lights AND found us the most Perfect! Moose for our front porch!!!

Before he made it to the porch he did have to do a little moose ‘surgery’ before he was ready for display! We ended up having to buy the display and apparently someone got a little too happy with the wire cutters! Thankfully Dean knows just enough wiring tips to fix our moose!

My Daddy’s nick name was moose when he was playing football. I Love that we have our very own Moose for Christmas guarding our house! I know the moose would have never been fixed without him! He had plenty of tools/supplies in our garage to fix him!

One of my Favorite little boys came over to see me this evening.
Drake seemed to like our moose also!

We had some nice family time with Ryan today. He is still doing about the same.
His oxygen settings haven’t changed.

 He is still breathing too fast at
times and it is hampering him being able to take a bottle.

Dean was able to give him a bottle today. Ryan took about 14mls. That has been a lot for him.

Ryan made a huge stinky while in Daddy’s lap.

We got soo tickled! I couldn’t resist taking a few pics of our family ‘tending’ to the stench!

I’m not sure why but it seems like every time I feel like we’ve had a really good day something happens to turn it into one of the very worst days.

We spent the entire overnight up with a very sick puppy. Smokey (who thinks he is a Doberman) has been overly protective lately and while the dogs were outside he made an advance at one of our big dogs and ended up becoming very hurt.

Our little fella has two broken ribs, a small puncture into his chest cavity, and abdominal hernia.

We are taking him to our vet as soon as it opens for them to evaluate him further and decide if he needs any surgery this morning.

Camo Men

Ryan has had a pretty low key day. He has slept much of the day. No orders at this time.

Today was Daddy’s turn to spoil the munchkin.

He held him for a bit before Ryan just about ran us outta the room with stank! Daddy saved him though he changed his diaper with little man in his lap.Can you guess how many parents it takes to change a diaper???

Two! One to change the diaper and one to hold the pacci and work the camera!!

Dean helped with Ryan’s weight/bath this evening. His weight was up tonight. He now weighs 1870. That is 4lbs 2oz!!

Dean held Ryan through his feeding tonight. The nurse insisted that Ryan wear a hat. Only thing is that neither of his hats wanted to stay put!! For that reason he sported his razorback AND camo hats.

His camo fit him better. . . I guess he just had to be like daddy!

His temp dipped a bit after he was weighed so we weren’t able to spend the time with him out of his house that we would have liked.

I know that each day we are one step closer to coming home but at times I just wish we were through with the hospital and had my baby at home.

One step forward, Two steps back

Ryan had a pretty crummy night last night. His breathing pattern was very fast for most of the night. It continued throughout most of the day.  Around 1ish the nurse had to call Dr. B because he was breathing very fast, NOT moving around, and when she checked his oxygen saturation it was in the 70’s.

Our little man is now on a cannula. He is at room air on the percentage of oxygen and the flow rate is 1.5 liters/minute. He is however breathing much easier and slower!

 

 

Mom stayed with Ryan much of the afternoon while I attempted to finish cleaning closets and washing clothes. She held him pretty much all afternoon! He seemed to really enjoy his time with Gammie.

Ryan’s breathing pattern had calmed so drastically that he was able to take a bottle at 2pm. He surprised everyone and took an entire feeding by bottle! He took all 38mls!

Dean and I spent some time with little man this evening. He does seem to be resting much better. The three of us tag teamed Ryan during his bath tonight! He weighed in at 1880 grams. He only gained 10 grams BUT he measured 1.5 inches longer this week!! He is now 16 inches long!!

 

 

 

This litte stink very coordinatedly rolled himself from his side to his back! I notice he was on his back when we arrived and didn't think a thing about it. After I changed his diaper I placed him on his side. While holding his pacci I noticed him fidigiting. He has appaently done this many times before because he knew exactly how to 'work' his feet to pick his bottom up and roll himself to his back!!

He has also gotten very good with his head movement! He can lift his head up while laying back to look around! This is yet another reminder that WHEN we Finally get to bring him home we are not brining home a newborn but a 3-4 month old baby!

The nurse let us try a bottle feeding with Ryan tonight. He did very well for about the first 10 minutes before he tuckered out. He took a strong 7mls tonight.

He was pretty tired after his bath. His nurse said that she would try him again on his bottle later this evening. Most likely the bath/weight was too much for his little system before taking a bottle.

I have so many mixed emotions/feelings. I hate that he regressed throughout this week on his oxygen. I LOVE that has more gump to take a bottle. I’m just trying to keep it straight in my mind that we can go home on oxygen and Can take a bottle on his current oxygen settings. Had we stayed on the same path we most likely would not be home any time soon. At least now he can practice building up his endurance taking bottle even if it means we bring him home on oxygen.

 

 

WPS!!

Ryan had a fairly un eventful day/night. It was another day of zero orders.

Gammie came and sat with Ryan while Mommy worked today. She was even able to hold for a while.

Ryan watched his first Razorback game today!

We missed Ryan’s weigh in today but the nurse said he weighed 1855 grams! That’s 4lbs 1oz!!!! We are so proud of you baby boy! We can’t wait to get you home!

Happy Thanksgiving and 3 Months!!

We have so many blessings to be thankful for this year! Our day has pretty much centered around our favorite thanksgiving blessing.

It is amazing to think back at my 475 gram fragile baby boy. He has truly fought an amazing fight to spend the holidays with his family. He weighed in tonight at 1760grams! That is 3lbs 140z!!

Today our little man celebrated his First Thanksgiving and his Three month birthday!!!!

This month has been truly amazing! Our little man has been up to quite a lot!

He was weaned off of his oxygen only a week one week of receiving his final mls of blood! He has impressed us all at how well he is breathing! He still has periods where he breathes faster than he should but his has done a tremendous job at staying off of his oxygen!

He has gained more sufficient control over his eyes this month. He is now tracking objects and will look toward verbal stimuli. He is very expressive with his eyes. They are still blue for the time being! His last eye exam didn’t go completely as we’d hoped. He has now developed a grade one retinopathy. He will now begin weekly eye exams to keep close watch on his eyes. His doctor still said that he has some of the best eyes that he’s seen and that with his week of increased oxygen behind him that his eyes could get better. He said sometimes the eyes tend to get worse before they correct themselves and get better.

In this last month Ryan has celebrated Two Holidays! He had his first Halloween and his first Thanksgiving. Unfortunately Mommy felt like she missed them both but Christmas she promises WILL be a different story!

Ryan is becoming stronger before our eyes. He can now pick his head up for long periods of time to look around. I’ve even caught him with his head, torso, and lower extremities lifted off of the bed! He is also attempting to master the art of scooting/crawling. As long as he has something to push off of he can scoot himself around his isolette!

This month Ryan was moved to the Final unit he must stay in before he can come home!!!  He was able to spend his First two nights with Mommy and Gammie taking care of him this month! To us that was the biggest blessing that the staff could give us this Thanksgiving week!!

He has made great strides in his growth this month. It was a hard fight/struggle to get to 2-3lbs but once we made it he is surprising us daily at how fast he is growing!! Its crazy to think that within a few days I will have not only a 4lb baby boy but a baby boy who is ready for an open crib!!!!

In this third month of Ryan’s life we have finally felt that we could ‘somewhat’ breathe a little easier!! It is so amazing to look back and see where we started and how far he has come! Keep up the good work Munchkin!!!