March 6, 2009

Friday was a good day for Cohen. He only had a few A&B’s and only had de-sats immediately following his feeds. He has been rocking the 21% oxygen, but is still on the cannula due to the doctor not wanting to overwhelm him. The open crib has been working well, although he has to wear 2-3 outfits, a hat, and 3+ blankets to keep is temperature above 36.5. I was really surprised Cohen’s doctor allowed him to stay in the open crib, due to how many layers he has to wear in order to stay warm!

Oral Feeds is the next big step for Cohen. He needs to master taking all feeds by mouth via a nipple (a bottle nipple or the other kind…) in order to be discharged. He will be 33 weeks on Tuesday, and the suck, swallow, breathe process is usually not present until 34 weeks gestation. Cohen, however, is giving good hunger cues (waking up for feeds, sucking on his pacifier, rooting, and even seemingly interested in breastfeeding) so his doctors are going to allow oral feeds to begin next week. Cohen’s doctor today (one of two) indicated that the aggressive feeds would be by bottle and he would continue to get a chance to breastfeed at a dry breast. I expressed my concern with nipple confusion and whatnot, but the option is to wait another 2 weeks to just attempt breastfeeding, or start with the bottle and as he masters “suck, swallow, breathe” transition him to breastfeeding. The second option allows for a potentially sooner discharge (well, if you consider 3-4 weeks soon…). I’m still at little apprehensive about it, but Carter started with a bottle in the hospital and transitioned to breastfeeding just fine. AND, I am pretty motivated by the caloric expenditure of breastfeeding so I don’t think I will have a problem making Cohen take the boob. His doctor also promised this would all be overseen by the lactation specialist.

John’s aunt and uncle, Gary and Diana, stopped in for a visit. I was able to sneak them in together for about 45 min! They were on their way to Texas for some sun…I’m jealous!
John and Carter got here around 4pm, and Carter has been such a happy little baby for me…so I don’t really believe he was being as difficult as John says. Haha, yeah right! I felt all the bumps in his poor mouth, and it makes my mouth hurt thinking about it.