Guest Post (forgive the philly accent)

Michael has been so kind to allow me (his wife and mother of his child) to have one "Guest Post."  I know, I know.... Michael is such a good writer... blah, blah, blah...can his head get any bigger?  As I write this, he is sitting over my shoulder laughing at my typos and making snide remarks (I just asked him how to spell snide... snyde?  Teachers are not the best spellers actually). 

I have taken my computer to the hospital for six days in a row now, but have yet to take it out of the bag.  I was hoping to respond to emails from over three weeks ago, but still I am behind on replying to all of your wonderful messages!  During the day, I just hold Edward all of the time (or as much as possible in between his cares).    He is doing well, gaining weight like a champ (4 lbs 12 oz!)

He had an interesting week, full of ups and downs as the NICU saga continues. On Tuesday, he was really struggling, working too hard to breathe and they ended up giving him blood because his hematocrit was low.  I walked into the NICU to find a bunch of doctors and nurses around his crib, which is usually not a good sign and not the best thing to walk into first thing in the morning.  The nurses tried to get an IV in him four times but couldn't with him wriggling around, so he was crying and crying.  Finally, success!  He was tanked up blood (and turned a hilarious shade of pink!).  An hour later, he had his eye exam, which is quite gruesome to watch (his eyelids are clamped open with these metal clips---- it is so awful to see, and then his eyes remain swollen for the rest of the day!) and not the best news either.  Both of his eyes are still at the stage 2 retinopathy, but his right eye has progressed a little further now.  He was crying and crying again.  As a result, I was a sight to see!  Tears, snot, and many tissues later, I managed to calm down.   Then, Wednesday he was due for his two month vaccinations!  TERIBBLE!  He received three needles in his legs that were combinations of six/seven? different vaccinnations.  They totally wiped him out! He had a temperature and was crying and crying. The doctors try not to give tylenol as there is some evidence to suggest that it might affect the body's immune response to the vaccines (Michael just helped me edit this sentence, can you tell?).  Therefore, he had to tough it out!  Because of this, Wednesday night was a rough night!  He had five to seven apnea/bradacardia episodes. They had to bump him back up to 4 liters of oxygen, which is what we started with three weeks ago..... Therefore, again, I was a sobbing lunatic.  Finally, things seem to calm down for Edward and he is back to his normal self!  And they have weaned his oxygen back down to 2 liters (and today they weaned him even further to 1 liter so cross your fingers!).

Well, I have really enjoyed this opportunity to communicate with everyone.  I might even start my OWN blog....haha.   Say some prayers for his eyes and his lungs :)  NEED MORE PRAYERS!