Ryan is 7 months corrected today. That means he was supposed to be born 7 months ago today. This is the age that some doctors and professionals use to assess how he's doing. The professionals I prefer don't look at this as an age, they account for the setbacks he's had along the way - in order to make sure he himself is progressing. If I get stuck in the trap of analyzing what a 'typical' 7 month old would be doing, it gets discouraging. Especially if I compare to what Sadie was doing at 7 months... she was a bit of a machine, and decided to walk at 10 months. Ryan is going to do what he's going to do. His oxygen needs have been going down, and his oral intake has been going up. Way up. We are cautiously optimistic about this new increase in oral intake - because we've seen this before. However, a few details are different this time 'round. Mainly, his decreased oxygen and the fact that his reflux seems to be better managed at this time. Feeding Ryan isn't like feeding a 'typical' baby. It's a process. Sometimes a 2 person process. He's taking his formula from a sippy cup (after trying almost every cup on the market, we've narrowed it down to 2 that have the combined 'perfect' flow). He doesn't cuddle while he eats - he sits upright in his high chair. We have a pile of toys beside us to distract him from swatting at the cup (he's not swatting at it because he doesn't want it, his hands are very busy - and they sometimes don't do what he wants them to do). He will, however finish a feed in a 'typical' time frame of about 20 minutes which is WAY better than when we would have to give his feeds through the tube which took upwards of 45 minutes, often while he wailed and squirmed around. He still has his feeding tube, and the plan is still to go ahead with the g-tube insertion - but if he continues on his streak of eating well, there's a chance that we could postpone the surgery and give him a try without the NG tube for a week or so. There are A LOT of factors that still have to come into play before that happens, and the surgery date is less than a month away, so we'll see what happens. I'm trying not to lose sleep over it but who are we kidding.
His sleep pattern is pretty good, although if I could change anything it would be his 'fighting' to get to sleep. We know when he's tired - we try to pre-empt him getting over tired, but he still fights sleep. We have a lullaby CD in his room and we each (me, the nurse, and martine) have a 'song limit' - if he doesn't give in after a certain number of songs, we switch people or give up. There has to be a better way... He used to go to sleep on his own as soon as we noticed the first signs of tired we'd put him in his crib and he'd sleep right away. He had great self soothing techniques when he was in hospital - I guess now that he's more aware and interested in the world, he's realizing that being awake is more fun than sleeping... maybe??
The Baxter thing is still weighing heavy on my mind. My ideal solution for him is that someone like Cesar (The dog whisperer) would come along, take Bax and train him to not bark at the door, and also train him as a therapy dog so that we could have him at home to grow old with us. I can't ease my mind about the fact that he'll be somewhere else to live out the rest of his days.... which are still many - he's only 5 and a half.
We've all pretty much had it with winter. Today Sadie wore her favourite summer dress on top of pants and a 3/4 sleeve shirt. She got ready to go to the grocery store wearing her summer sun hat, rain boots, mitts, and a fleece underneath her spring coat. She pretty much had all the seasons covered. Talk about an identity crisis.
Ryan's laughing video is a big hit. He was grumpy today - smiles and giggles were few and far between... until Sadie came downstairs. She was being her silly self and he thought it was hilarious. It really does make everything better to hear the sound of baby laughs. Especially the sound of a baby like Ryan laugh. I wish I could send it to some of my favourite 'worst case scenario' doctors.
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