Home Sweet Home

We are SO happy to report we are home again. The hospital was getting a bit old after spending 3 out of 4 weeks in april there. Don't get me wrong....the staff was great, but it's just not home. After Evan was poked, proded, and turned inside out.....we found out....as stephan says "he's perfect". EVERYTHING came back NORMAL! Needless to say Stephan and I were quite frustrated at different times throughout our stay. Watching Evan go backwards wasn't easy. As much as I'd like to be able to switch Evan to formula, when he started doing so much worse on it....all I wanted to do was start his breastmilk again so he'd feel better. The doctors let us make that change. After his J-tube was pulled he felt some better. The doctors wanted to increase Evan's feedings gradually and we weren't getting past the 3tsp/2hours mark. Stephan and I felt like his stomach wasn't getting full enough to recognize there was food there to digest, and he was probably feeling crappy the whole time because he was hungry. We suggested increasing to 2oz every 2 hours to see how he did. The doctors were nervous about this because it's backwards from what they usually do, but they were out of ideas. It worked, and we kept increasing by 1/2 oz every 3 feedings until he's on the same routine he was before we went into the hospital. Sleeping through full feedings in the middle of the night even. Is all of his puking stopped, no, Evan is a puky baby, and hopefully he will out grow that sooner rather than later, but for now that's just how it is. However the pukes that were happening that we couldn't explain, and were causing us to be concerned that something else was wrong are gone. As far as Stephan and I are concerned, they were caused by the furdantin (antibiotic he was on for his kidneys) that we started feb 4th. The timing matches, we didn't notice a change in his vomiting when we started it, we think it was a gradual change. We also don't think switching him to a formula cold turkey is a good idea, his stomach is just too touchy. Once things really settle out we're planning on switching him more gradually. Those two things combined with catching some virus that gave him some extra vomiting/diarrhea, and a fever are what we feel were the cause of all the trouble these past months. So Good news is all of the test came back normal, bad news is Evan really didn't need all of those tests. Hind sight is always 20/20, but I wish I'd thought of the antibiotic being a possible cause of the increased trouble we were having, maybe we could have avoided this whole mess.

While Evan was admitted Stephan and I snuck out for a few hours to visit a good friend we hadn't seen since Evan was in the NICU. It was really nice to see him, and to get out of the hospital, and away from the stress for a bit, and into the sunlight....HELLO SPRING! when we came back we found Evan being pulled around by a volunteer in a wagon, waving Hi to people, and showing them his toys. I really don't think he missed us at all.

Evan also got to meet his great grandma K during his first admission last month, and his great grandma and grandpa H during his second admission. I'm posting a picture of him giving G-Grandma K a forehead kiss, and of him, and stephan with G-grandma and grandpa H with the awesome balloon they brought him that he just LOVED.

So we came home yesterday, started settling back in, today we did some more of that. Stephan is now sick with what we believe is the same bug Evan had.....spening a fair amount of time close to the rest room, hopefully he'll be feeling better soon. We all spent some time outside today. Visiting with neighbors, evan loves our neighbor Becky's new puppy Darby, a golden retriever....who's great with children it seems. We played in the grass, and I got up on our roof and cleaned out the gutters. Had to have the neighbors come over with a bigger ladder to help me get down though....was too scared to come off the roof with our smaller less strudy ladder.....it really wasn't that bad getting up I swear! did some picking up and raking.....got a long ways to go though.