All Babies Spit Up....

After being home for almost a week, my mom innocently asked "How much is Edward spitting up?"

 "None!" I happily replied.  And it was true.   The first five to six days at home, Edward did not spit up once.  He was still learning to take bottles and was not taking large volumes, but sure enough he had not spit up a single time.  In fact, throughout his entire NICU stay, I think he only threw up 2-3 times total.

We were overjoyed with our luck!  Then lady luck looked the other way.  Edward was pretty gassy and somewhat fussy after most of his feeds, but then he started to spit up.  Not a lot at first and not with every feed, but it was fairly consistent throughout the course of a day.  We started holding him upright for over an hour after every feed in case there was any element of reflux and hopefully decrease the amount of 'spit-up'.

One night, after a feed and holding him for about 90 minutes, we placed Edward in his bassinet next to our bed.  Ten minutes later, "BLEH!"  with vomitus going through the bassinet and onto the side of our bed.  It wasn't always quite that bad.  Mostly, he would take his feed, fuss for a little bit and then spit-up some white curdly stuff that wasn't very pleasant to smell.

Similar to the amount of breastmilk that he was actually taking in, these episodes of emesis were a cause of great discussion and angst.  I downplayed it at first, reminding Katie that 'all babies spit up,' which of course is true to some extent.  But despite repeatedly asking my opinion on various issues, Katie does not believe a word I say anymore....and I can't say that I blame her.  I have learned that it is impossible for me to simultaneously play father and physician.  Objectivity goes out the window when it is your own family.

Despite of all this, Edward still gained weight at our next pediatrician appointment!  In fact, he gained almost 7 ounces (nearly an ounce a day)!  Our pediatrician was thrilled and we were extremely pleased to have achieved such a significant weight gain.  But it seemed like we were killing ourselves to accomplish this.  Every feed was a battle and often ended in a change of clothes for Edward and one of us.  At the same time, the weight gain was so encouraging - clearly we were doing something right.

Then, week three happened....