One Week

Liam hit the one week mark today; that still puts him under 36 weeks gestational age.

Liam's admit note to the NICU said "infants between 34 and 35 weeks typically require 5-10 days in the NICU." With ten days just around the corner it doesn't look like Liam is going to make it. He failed a bunch of his feedings with me (it turns out I "cuddle" him too much when he feeds and he falls asleep too fast. Who ever heard of a mother cuddling her son too much??) and he didn't gain any weight yesterday.

At this one week point I find myself fairly discouraged. I really wanted to get him home in the next couple of days. The NICU docs are all optomistic and shrug their shoulders at Liam's slow progress,"Some kids are just like that," they say,"especially boys." The staff have likened learning to feed to learning to ride a bicycle: you can practice for days and you don't make any progress, then you ride for a little stretch only to fall off on your next attempt, and then one day, for no particular reason, it just clicks and you never have trouble again. Unfortunately, Liam still needs the training wheels.

As we were coming home from the hospital today I told Mac,"we need to get Liam home so we can be a family."
Mac responded,"We are a family; we're just dysfunctional."

You see, having Liam at the hospital has changed the family dynamic more than any new baby at home could possibly do. Mac and I are switching back and forth to make sure both Liam and Megan are getting plenty of attention, but we aren't seeing each other much. On the days I mostly stay home with Megan, I feel guilty for neglecting my newborn son; on the days I do extra time at the hospital I feel like I am abandoning Megan. And I feel terrible that Megan hasn't seen her little brother for five days, but she has been kind of sick and we don't want to risk it. Mac has things harder, because he has to keep chauffering me back and forth as well as himself, since I am still unable to drive. And then there is that dreaded breast torture machine, also known as the pump. I have a date with the machine every 3-4 hours. In the last five days I have pumped over a gallon and a half of milk - just call me Bessie!

I've also been discouraged by my progress. I am not in that much pain, but I am EXHAUSTED! I wake up from my sleep feeling more tired than I was when I went to bed. The doctors told me my blood loss was so severe that it could take me two months to get back to normal counts. In fact, if I hadn't otherwise been young and healthy I might have even gotten a blood transfusion (at one point it was discussed, but both my doc and I decided against it). But still, a week after surgery I feel like I should be on the rebound; besides I can't even complain about late night feedings (though I do have to get up to pump at least once). And today I was horrified to discover that I am completely numb around my incision site, especially at each end. (Hey c-section people: did this happen to you? did it go away??).

Mac demonstrates the proper non-cuddling way to feed Liam. Though we enjoy the time with Liam, it seems like we do little else besides go back and forth to the hospital to feed him.

I did get to give him his first real bath yesterday - a highlight of his NICU stay. Our little Aquarius took right to the water. I think he's looking pretty cute here in the tub, if we could only get rid of that God-awful tube down his nose! You might notice he's a bit yellow, but his jaundice never got to the point where it required therapy and his bilirubin levels are starting to come down already, so he should be a healthy pink in no time.