Two Weeks

Hi, Everyone.

It’s been two weeks since Emrick was born, and I finally feel like I have a moment to write a post without falling asleep at the computer. Right now he is relaxing on a blanket on the family room floor — awake, but not fussing, I guess because his bum is dry and his belly is full.

Thanks to everyone for the congratulations and well wishes on the day of the c-section. And thank you to Marcus, especially, for doing such a good job of documenting everything from that day and getting it posted in real time! … including my radiant, bloated beauty 😉

My recovery is going great. I really didn’t know what to expect, but after reading online advice that said things like, “If you have a two-story house, don’t climb the stairs for two weeks, except to go to bed at night” I thought I might be really laid up! But I wasn’t. The pain has been very minimal, and in fact, I climb the stairs several times every day!! I guess the worst of the recovery took place in the three days following surgery, when I was in the hospital anyway, being waited on. So it wasn’t bad. Marcus and I were both impressed by all the nurses who tended to me during my stay. They were all really nice and helpful, and as c-sections go, I couldn’t have asked for things to go more smoothly.

Anyway, today Emrick had his two-week check-up with the pediatrician, and he’s doing well. His weight looks good, his jaundice is clearing up, and his hearing is fine. All three of those things had been concerns when we were discharged from the hospital: 1) At the time of our check-out, he had lost more weight than what they consider safe for a newborn (a small amount of post-birth weight loss is considered normal); 2) His billirubin levels were high, and still rising, causing him to be quite jaundiced; 3) His left ear had failed the hearing test given to all newborns.

Because of numbers one and two above, a couple of days after getting home I began pumping breast milk and feeding it to him from a bottle so I could be sure he was getting enough. After doing that for two days, his fourth and last billirubin test (taken last week) finally showed a decline. So I stuck with the pump and now it’s just what we do. I still wasn’t sure if I was feeding him enough — sometimes he seems insatiable — but today he weighed what every baby is supposed to weigh at two weeks: roughly their initial birth weight. At 7 lbs, 5 oz., he was right on target.

After the pediatrician, we took him across the street to the audiologist where his left ear passed the hearing test. They had mentioned in the hospital that sometimes amniotic fluid in the ear can cause a test to fail, and that it would clear up on its own if that were the case with Emrick. I guess they were right.

So that’s where things are. Since I am home all day, changing diapers, boiling nipples, and trying to “sleep when the baby sleeps”, I will try to post some new pics of Emrick every day. I can’t promise great photography, just a great-looking baby with a fabulous head of hair 🙂