Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Teething, Eating, Gaining, and a New Baby _____

So our little guy finally actually has a tooth coming through. He was super fussy all evening on Sunday, and when I looked in his mouth I saw the little bump on his bottom gum! He's been pretty comfortable since then with Tylenol. It's pretty cute though; he keeps running his tongue over the spot like, "Hey, what's this?"

And... Owen is EATING! Not a ton, and nowhere near enough calories to get rid of the G-tube, but he eats! He's been eating the Gerber Graduates puffs, and doing a little bit better with baby food lately. It's also fairly common for him to take about 4 ounces of formula for us at a time. So, frustrating as it is that we still have the tube, I really do think we'll be without it someday.

It's actually a good thing we still have the tube, because Owen has been upped to 36 ounces a day. Which doesn't sound like a lot, until you think about how many calories that is. His formula is mixed at 30 calories per ounce, so that's over 1000 calories per day! Formula mixed the normal way (and breast milk) is about 20 calories per ounce. All this may actually be having an effect, because when I weighed him this morning he was closing in on 15 pounds! It would be great if that's real, but I'm slightly concerned that he may be retaining fluid. After all, last week he only weighed 14 pounds. So I'll be keeping an eye on his weight to see if this is just a random jump (he tends to have those) or if it's something to be concerned about.

So our little guy has definitely been reaching some milestones and doing better all the time. And soon we'll have to be more specific than saying "our little guy." That's right - Owen's having a baby brother! I'm at 22 weeks and feeling good. We're thinking about names but haven't settled on anything for sure yet (and we probably won't until Bean's born.) He's been pretty active lately - it's both exciting and nauseating to feel him moving around in there!

We're getting ready for our first Christmas in our new house. Owen loves the lights, of course, and is enthralled by the train we have around the Christmas tree. A few days ago he "helped" Mark look at the ads in the paper. Okay, so he mainly grabbed the papers and waved them around a lot. So I think he'll have fun with the wrapping paper. Speaking of which, I need to get to it! I wish presents wrapped themselves sometimes. =)

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

A Healthy Baby...

Is exactly what it appears we're having! Our ultrasound today showed all of the appropriate parts, formed the appropriate ways, and in the appropriate places. It also showed one particular part that tells us the gender of the baby. Yes, we're going to tell. No, not today! We're waiting until we have a chance to tell our families before announcing it here.

Our experiences with having children have obviously been anything but typical. The doctor looking over the ultrasound (the same one that delivered Owen) said, "Well, I can't find anything wrong with this kid." It was music to our ears, but I'm sure it's not exactly the phrase uttered by most OB/GYNs upon analyzing ultrasound images! During our first ultrasound with Owen, I was excited during it, and terrified after. This time I was terrified during it, and excited after. Given this good result, we are not having amniocentesis performed this time. We will simply wait and have the new baby's chromosomes analyzed once he/she is born.

Meanwhile... Baby Owen has an ear infection. =( He had a fever on Monday, and his temp came down out of fever range but has remained high since. He's been cranky and wanting to be held constantly. I talked to his pediatrician's office Monday, and they weren't concerned. We saw the cardiologist this morning; he looked in Owen's ears and declared the left one fine, but the right one he couldn't see in because of too much wax. He wasn't concerned either. However, once I got to my regular OB's office (yes, we had 3 doctor appts scheduled today,) he had developed a discharge from his right ear. I took him over to an urgent visit center and sure enough, the pediatrician thought Owen's eardrum had ruptured. Hence the discharge, fever, and irritability. Poor bubby. So now we have two antibiotics to give him. Hopefully he'll be out of the miserable stage soon! It's heartbreaking to see him so sad and in pain.

On the plus side, though, our cardiology appointment went great! The cardiologist says Owen's doing very well. We get to discontinue one of his meds altogether, and go down to once a day on another one. So we're back to the schedule we had before this surgery. Also, Owen officially gained 12 ounces in less than a month! This is huge for him, and the cardiologist was really happy with that. So hopefully we can continue these positive trends, and get Owen feeling better soon! We want our bubby to be able to enjoy all the fun Christmas events!