We have reached quite the milestone this past few weeks. Our favorite one so far? Being home longer than being in the hospital! When Quince hit 7 weeks old, we had been officially home longer. Yay! As of today, he is now 2 months old and doing well.

Yesterday we spend the day in Seattle revisiting Swedish. There were many highlights of the day but one of the better ones was seeing our friend Maria and her mother. We met randomly one day in the NICU family lounge shortly after we arrived. Her twins are few days older than Quince. Our kids had the same care times, so we saw each other often until Quince was moved to ISCU that last week. I went into NICU with her to see her son and I couldn’t believe how big he’s gotten now! We didn’t have a chance to see her daughter, who has been moved to ISCU. With any luck, Maria and her husband will be able to take their daughter home soon!

The first of our appointments was with the PEDS clinic in Swedish. We arrived a bit early, but that was ok as it gave me a chance to feed Quince beforehand.  He was awake, alert and chatty for the whole thing. This was great as his impressed his therapist as she performed her different skill tests. Overall he did well and is right on target; she commented on both his strength and how good his head control is for his age. We were quite happy. Our “homework” from her is to work on his shoulders more. He tends to flop them out to the sides, never bringing them up to his chest. Also we are to continue to aid him in rolling from either stomach to side or back to side.  She noticed that Quince likes to extend his legs so her recommendation is to avoid standing aids, no jumpers, exer-saucers, walkers, etc. Basically nothing that he can do leg extensions and push off with.  We visit them again when he’s 6 months old.

Our next stop was his neurologist’s office. She found him to be normal and doing well so far. We are decreasing his keppra and is looking to discontinue use of that medication at his next appointment. His phenobarbital medication has be readjusted for his weight change as well. Right now we have an appointment for perform a normal one hour EEG, then a follow up with the neurologist that same day. Should there be concerns during this month he’ll shift from the one hour to a 24 EEG. Hopefully that’s not the case! She has asked us to repeat a couple blood work tests as they had mild abnormal results when they were done before. In two weeks we will get his phenobarb level checked(also a blood draw).

Next week is his 2 month well baby check up and shots. Hopefully he’ll take the upcoming shots like he did when he got his hep-b the day we left Swedish, it was one or two individual cries then he was done and fell asleep.

Update! July 21 -At his 2 month well baby, Quince impressed his pediatrician with how well he can hold up his head. She told me the angle he can hold it up to is close to that of a 4 month old baby. Woot! She was pleased with how he looks, as well as his growth thus far. He said he is right on target for a baby his age even though he’s on the small side. For those who are savvy he is 22 inches(10%), 11 lbs 2 oz(25%) and head is 37.2 cm(5%). As long as he continues at a good rate there are no concerns. Quince was great through his shots! Getting out about 4 cries and then looked as if he was wronged before falling asleep. He then spent the rest of the day sleeping. I decided not to attend baby group that day since he was so out.
Two weeks ago we got a blood draw for a re-run of a couple genetic tests, our lab tech who drew the blood did a great job and he hardly cried at all. Overall a much different experience from our first draw here. The hard part of those tests was having it take 4 tries to get enough urine. I can’t express enough how annoying it is to try and get a urine sample from an infant. You don’t think about it as an adult because we have control of our bladders, but an infant is not only another person but they don’t have conscience control. You can’t get out the cup and say “Please go pee now.” Instead you put on this bag and wait, hopefully they don’t poop and get it in the bag because if they do then you clean them up and get a new bag. The first two times were no good, the 3rd time they didn’t get a enough and the 4th time was the charm!

Just a few days ago, we were back at the lab again for a draw to measure his phenobarbital levels. We got the same lab tech as before, and again she did a great job with him. He had to get stabbed twice again because the first time he just didn’t want to give up blood. I think we had nearly all of the techs in there fawning over him by the time we left. One of the girls had scrubs on which he liked to look at and even cried when she walked a way. That caused her to walk back, when she did he got quiet and went back to looking at her. It was pretty funny actually and all while he was getting the blood draw. He fell asleep on the way home from the hospital and again spent the rest of the day in “rest” mode. They had to take a sizable amount of blood for his size so it’s no wonder he wanted to just sleep! We should hear about the results next week.