MR. MOM

I am entering Week 2 as Mr. Mom! I have to admit I don't think stay at home moms are given enough credit for what they do. I only have one to look after and a couple days last week I found myself wondering where the day went. At this point, I couldn't imagine having another one, or two, (or more), babies/kids to look after! For those of you that do...God Bless ya!

Today Elijah had his doctor's appointment locally with his pediatrician and there isn't a lot of new stuff to report. The doctor is encouraged with the amount of weight he has put on since his last appointment. He now weighs in at 10 lbs. 4 oz. Looking on-line for some comparison I found 15 lbs to be around where a 3 month old should be. We still got some work to do but we'll get to where we need to be by "average" standards.

Our next goal is to get to Children's Hospital in Milwaukee so they will be able to tell us more about his heart. Locally the pediatric cardiologist cannot figure out what is causing the high blood pressure in and around his heart. That is a very busy place, The Children's Hospital, which is sad because that means a lot of sick kids but they are getting some of the best care available. Realistically we are looking at the end of September but a lot depends on the doctors schedule.

In talking with a few folks the long term plan for Children's Hospital is to have a facility in Green Bay! That is years down the road. If that was the case now, it would make a lot of families lives easier getting the care they need closer to home. I know they have a facility in Appleton, but sounded like the same doctors split their time at both facilities, mostly in Milwaukee.

We will keep you updated the best we can. We thank you again for your thoughts, prayers, and continued support. Take care, see you soon.

Challenging times

Elijah has been home for two weeks already!! For some reason it seems longer than that. Things have been going okay for the most part. It seems like we have spent most of our time feeding him and juggling multiple appointments. We are definately learning a lot about our little man, especially how he likes to get up at 3am. He has been really fussy lately due to being constipated. They think that maybe his iron supplements may be contributing factor, also that children with chromosome disorders are at a higher risk of having constipation. We have been giving him suppositories to help ease some of the straining that he has been doing. When he strains himself he pushes out his stomach and it winds up irritating the area around his MIC-key button and that makes him really uncomfortable. His feedings are still taking us about an hour or more. They keep increasing his intake amount and we have to watch out how fast we give it to him otherwise he will spit up. Right now I think we are most frusturated with having to carefully move around his oxygen hose and his apnea monitor cord. We cannot wait until we do not have to have those anymore.

We had a follow up appointment with Elijah's cardiologist today. He is going to have to stay on the oxygen and the apnea monitor for a while. He still has high pulmonary hypertension (high blood pressure) in his heart and they cannot figure out why and need more sophisticated equipment. We are going to have to take a trip to Children's Hospital in Milwaukee and have a heart catheter done and depending on the results he may get treated for it right away.


We are trying to get into a routine as quick as possible since my maternity leave ends and I have to go back to work on the 20th, which makes me so sad :( But, Steve is going to play Mr. Mom for a while until he finds employment. When that happens we are thinking of putting him in daycare, but need to find one that handles children with special needs. We will keep up all updated as things move along with Elijah.



Thanks again for all of your support and kind words!!! Oh....if you want to stop by and see Elijah, don't hesitate to give us a call.