June 8 - 13 Abacadabra Hands

Tuckered out after play time, Sunday night June 5th. When she is in a deep sleep, she often holds her fingers out straight as though she is casting a spell on you--- I call it "abacadabra". The blanket is tucking her hands in sideways, but she would otherwise be pointing them straight at the camera, even though she is completely relaxed. All of my babies have done abacadabra at this age-- maybe all babies do. But it is just one of those newborn things I find so darn cute.

Well, the sad day finally came that Justin's parents had to go home. We are all adjusting. Our new babysitter is wonderful in every way except that she is new to our kids-- so that makes it more of an adjustment for everyone, especially for Eden, the oldest. She has felt very unsure of our new friend and is feeling protective of her baby brother. Most days have gone really well. However, there was one day when the doors to the house were locked when all the kids got home from school, --because Gideon has been figuring out how to open the door and go outside on his own-- and because she was upstairs when they knocked repeatedly, no one came to the door, and Eden became very frightened. Her imagination went wild with worries over her baby brother, and when the door finally opened she was angry with our new sitter and shouted at her before running to the playhouse for a secret phone call to me. We talked for a while and she calmed down. She knew her fears were irrational, but it was a sad example of how the stress over our family situation is affecting her. The other kids show their stress in other ways. My 8 year old has been having continence issues during the day and clings to me, and my 6 year old has been more moody and disobedient than usual. We're all working out our kinks, and time together is the best therapy. This too shall pass.

The hardest thing about our new schedule is that Justin's time with the baby is very limited. He made a spontaneous visit on Friday night and she was very awake for him. He and the nurse gave her a bath, and he didn't realize that her outfit was a special favorite of mine, something that belonged to her and was labeled in the collar with her name. It was thrown in the general hospital laundry and I hope we see it again! At this writing it has been two weeks of asking every day and it hasn't yet shown up in their linen room.

Go ahead and say it. Awwwwww.

So, I asked the nurse, (being of limited experience with the froo froo girly baby thing), how do they get the bow to stick? I'd heard of KY jelly, but this stays way better. It's Elmer's Glue. LOL! Makes sense, I suppose, water soluble and all, just seems incredibly funny.

Because Dr Black has opted to increase her milk feedings intermittently instead of tying her milk amount to a ratio according to her weight increases, her TPN (intravenous nutrition that is dangerous to the liver) has been creeping up again. Justin was worried about this, and during his visit the nurse mentioned that one thing they can do is to fortify her breastmilk with formula, which somehow allows them to give her less TPN. We agreed to it, and they started her almost immediately, while warning us that some babies do not tolerate the rich milk well. We decided to give it a try. During rounds on Monday the nutritionist (who knows my concern about colic in my other babies and their sensitivity to dairy in my diet, and who agreed with me that I ought to go off cow's milk until we know whether she is sensitive to it) noted that the formula being mixed into my milk was normal Similac, a cow's milk based formula. While my babies have liked this after about 4 months of age, before that age it has given some of them upset stomach. We decided to see what happened-- since she can't reflux, they watch the diapers for signs of a problem. And by Tuesday yes, we definitely got signs of a problem.... sooooo, she was put on a special formula for sensitive stomachs. Pregestimil, I think it is called. Since then she has seemed to do all right.

Ever since her hand surgery was canceled, she's been treated with a special salve called Meta Honey. Literally a medical grade metabolized honey, it somehow dissolves the dead tissue and leaks it away in a watery liquid, and stimulates the growth of new skin cells. When it was done, I could see how much of her skin had actually been killed by the calcium citrate, and it was a little scary. The hole was deep and almost the entire back of her hand. But when the edges of it were pink and bleeding (instead of white as they'd been before), I was told the wound nurse was really happy because that was a sign things were now truly healing and progressing as they should, because it meant the tissue is living.