Milestone!

Bennett had started to sleep longer at night consistently about three weeks ago. Instead of 3 hours between feedings, he slowly changed to 4 and then 5 hours. Then, two nights ago he went 7 hours and last night he went 8!!! Bennett slept through the night! We are a little excited. I think what has helped the most is that he is getting his thumb (as opposed to his whole hand) in his mouth consistently. He is able to calm himself and fall back to sleep when he wakes in the night. He even seems to be losing interest in the pacifier. He would much rather suck on his thumb.

Gearing up for vacation

We're headed to North Dakota in about 10 days. We are spending a week there and a week in Great Falls. And yes, we are driving. It should be very interesting with Bennett. We're taking the dog also...one big happy family. Bernie had to buy a luggage case for the roof to fit all of our junk into the Prius. I'm looking forward to the trip. It's going to be great for everyone to finally meet Bennett, especially my dad.

Other travel plans for the summer include Portland in June. I can't wait to see Emily and meet Grant. Crystal sent us a list of things to do that sound really fun. Mainly, I want to go to the beach. And maybe some shopping. My clothes fit weird post-baby and I think I have finally grown up. All of my clothes look like juniors...I'm ready to shop in the women's department.

I am planning to see Kristen and her family in June and also hope to see Sara sometime this summer (haven't discussed this with her yet). I want to make sure I take advantage of the time I have to see important people. Who knows when I will get the opportunity again?

Another exciting upcoming event is the garden. I am looking forward to getting my plans ready for flowers and vegetables. I think I'll scale back on the flowers this year because they were a lot of work last year and got very out of control by the end of the summer. More careful planning should help. I'll also need more time to deal with the vegetables.

Bennett has officially outgrown his 0-3 month clothes. I did the switcheroo to 3-6 months today. Baby clothes sizes seem to follow no logic. Even within the same brand, things fit differently. Carter's clothes can be bought at a number of places. 0-3 months from Target fits differently than the same size from the actual Carter's store. It's a bit annoying. He has a ton of clothes in this size range. I'm not sure if he will actually be able to wear them all.

I'm still pumping, but have almost entirely eliminated 2 sessions every day (including the one overnight...thanks Crystal). I think I will keep it up until we go to Portland in June. I'm definitely not hauling the pump to Oregon. He should be staring on solids then if everything goes well. I am supplementing about 4 oz of formula a day at this point, which is hardly anything considering he eats 30.

I love the medical community.

Really, I have conflicting feelings. Obviously, they did wonders for Bennett and I...we wouldn't be here without them. Bennett was supposed to get a Synagis shot today. He has been getting one once per month since he left the hospital to protect him from RSV. Preemies are at especially high risk for this dangerous respiratory disease and the shots are common practice. The first one we were supposed to get at home was not set up properly and we ended up having to have it done at the doctor's office at the last minute. The way the insurance company wants it done is as follows: we call and the shot is delivered via UPS to our house. It must be refrigerated immediately. Then the home health nurse is supposed to set up an appointment to give the shot at our house. I'm really not sure how this saves money, but whatever. Anyway, the first month this was screwed up on the home health side, it went fine last month, and we set up the appointment for this month last month. Then the nurse calls Bernie and tells him that she can't come today and reschedules for Wednesday. This isn't a huge deal in most cases, but we are going on vacation next month. The last shot will have to be early and now the window between them is even shorter. I am going to make sure this is OK at Bennett's MD appointment tomorrow.

Did I mention the series of shots costs $1400?

I won't go into great detail about how SHITTY the oxygen company was to deal with. We sat on hold for hours and got horrible service. Not to mention the fact that they are billing our insurance company over $200 per day (should have been a monthly charge) and they are just paying it! Now wonder insurance costs are rising. We need to call the insurance and tip them off because we tried to get the oxygen company to deal with it, but they haven't.

I might as well just finish my little rant here with how much this whole ordeal has cost. I know there is probably some curiosity about it. The grand total is somewhere in the $400,000 range. This includes:

$12,000 for a helicopter ride
$30,000+ for my medical care
$2200 per day for Bennett's MD visits while in the Level 3 NICU
$250,000 for his hospital stay
and thousands more in mich. xrays, meds, labs, etc.

I do not know what someone without insurance would have done. It easily would have wiped us out. But luckily we have really good insurance and our total out-of-pocket has been about $1000. The pile of insurance statements is a bit overwhelming.

SCARY!

Anyway, I will be done with my rant now. It's hard to understand the charges for some of this crap.

We have otherwise been doing well around here. Bennett is becoming more and more social. He smiles frequently and maintains good social eye contact. We need to get him more tummy time so his head lifts are stronger. I am waiting not-so-patiently for a good belly laugh from him.

I am going to be discussing formula supplementation with the MD tomorrow. Up until now, I have been pumping and he has been getting breast milk exclusively. My relationship with the pump has been deteriorating for a while now and I am ready to give it up. I feel good about having gotten this far. I was hoping to be done by the time we go on vacation next month. I might try to lessen the pumping sessions for a bit so he can still get mostly breast milk for awhile. We will see. I feel like I miss a lot of time with him because of the dreaded pump. But I'm sure there will be guilt if I stop. It's a no-win situation.

I've been lax about posting due to the influx of guests we've had over the past ten days. Bernie's parents were here for almost a week. We laid low a lot of the time, but did fit in a really good dinner in downtown Denver. They were having a restaurant week. For $52.80 a couple could eat a full course meal (5280 being Denver's elevation). Our meal was yummy and would have normally cost $50 per person, so it was a good deal. Jackie and I did some shopping and big Bernie cooked us a few meals. The Bernie's also created a fenced off vegetable garden separated from my flowers. I intend to make good use of it this summer.

The weather here continues to be mostly warm and mild. We have had a number of days in the 60's recently. My flowers started to come up about a month ago...I just hope they don't get zapped by any sudden cold.

The day Bernie's parents left, Bernie went up to the ski hill to meet up with some friends. He stayed three nights and had a great time. He came home with a pretty ugly bruise on his leg. My mom flew down the next day. I don't know if she put Bennett down for more than 15 minutes the entire time she was here. He even slept on her a lot of the time. I got to sleep a great deal which felt wonderful. She insisted on getting up almost every time. And she cooked. Three different kinds of cookies, pumpkin gingersnap tart, and chicken enchiladas. I think I will eat some for dinner.

Sorry about the flood of new photos on Flicker, but we took a bunch over the past 10 days.

Back to reality tomorrow. Bernie's back at work and mommy and Bennett are on their own again.

We had our pictures taken yesterday at JC Penny. They were not great, but there were a few good ones. Hopefully when they are posted online people will be able to see them. They would have turned out better if the lady had been running on time. Our appointment was for 11. We fed Bennett at 10 and he was smiley and in a good mood between 11 and 11:30. The session didn't even start until 11:30 and by the middle we had a crabby non-smiling baby on our hands. That will teach me to make the first appointment of the day.

Finally getting some sleep again...

Bernie was on his day shifts this past week. I try to let him sleep as much as possible, which equals not much sleep for me. However, Bennett is sleeping for longer periods of time at night...as long as he isn't battling his gas.

The awesome news we have is that Bennett is off of his oxygen! The doctor told me to take him off of it last week. I was paranoid all weekend that he wasn't getting enough, but he was in the mid 90's at the MD's office today. This is the most exciting development in our lives in a long time. I can actually carry him around the house on a whim! I don't have to switch tanks! I can use the mei tei carrier I bought! Hooray! There are pictures posted. He's awfully cute without any crap taped to his face.

Speaking of crap, Bennett didn't poop for three days. We had a blow out and repeated blow outs over the past couple of days. Fun times! Poop everywhere.

Grandma and Grandpa Meier are visiting this week. It has been nice to have Grandma feed him sometimes and give us a little extra sleep in the mornings. Bernie and his dad have been busy building me a garden for summer vegetable planting. Bennett is snuggling with Grandma as we speak. Just wait until my mom gets here this weekend...I won't get a cuddle in edge-wise.

Welcome to Ava Michelle! And congrats to Kristen and Phil. I really hope we get to meet her before she's marrying Bennett in 25 years.

Weight update

I don't have too much to write about, but Bennett weighed 9 lbs. 11oz. on Friday!

Sending out baby having vibes to Kristen. I know you are sooooo ready to move on to the next step!

Happenings

Things are pretty status quo around here lately. We have been having ongoing gas issues with Bennett. If anyone has any advice, we/he would appreciate it. We are trying the Dr. Brown bottles. Hopefully that will help in a few days.

I got the results of my HELLP blood work. Everything was negative, so it doesn't look like I have any underlying disorders. Basically that means my chances of preeclampsia are higher than a normal woman because I've had it before, but not extraordinarily higher. My doctor did not test for every possible disorder. He did not think it was necessary because not all of them are highly correlated. I guess I just need to trust the medical professional.

Bernie has been on his overnight shifts the last few days. These are my least favorite because he's gone all night and then sleeps all day. It's rough when Bennett is going three hours between when he starts eating and eats again. But last night, he went four hours both times! This was an exciting development. Here's hoping that it continues. He has a weight check tomorrow. He's probably in the high 8 lb. range. The newborn clothes are starting to get a little tight, but the 0-3 month stuff is still a bit big.

We are planning a trip to Great Falls/North Dakota in April/May. We are going to stay a whole week in each place. Melanie has her graduation in early May, so hopefully we can make it whatever kind of celebration she plans on having. Bernie's parents are coming to visit the first week in March and my mom will be here the second week. There are also whispers of visits from Marlena and my dad at some point. We'll see. There's also a trip to Portland in the works for June. We still haven't met our new nephew who was born in August.