Thanksgiving

Mom, Dad, and my youngest sister came to visit for the Thanksgiving holiday, which meant a lot of family and a lot more opportunity to drop Fluff off and get things done (without me feeling too guilty about it). They stayed at my grandparents' house around the corner, so we got the benefit of seeing family without the stress of having houseguests in the midst of everything else that is going on.

Wednesday and Thursday were particularly hard days for me emotionally. On Wednesday, I spent the time fretting about how my son was going to be in the hospital during one of my favorite holidays. On Thursday, I was just sad that my son was in the hospital, and feeling guilty for not being at his bedside all day--not that he is even usually aware of my presence in the first place, being asleep for the entirety of most of our visits.

I just couldn't get into Thanksgiving this year. While thankful for my husband and children and for the presence of family, I was pretty sorrowful and just plain worn out. It was much less than a holiday for me. I'm not saying that I couldn't wait until it was over, but I was relieved to go to sleep when all was said and done.

We started our Thanksgiving by visiting Squish in the hospital. He was (finally) wearing one of his 0-3 month onesies, which was a big deal for me because the previous nurse kept dressing him in the 3 and 6 month onesies we'd brought for him. He has a plethora of 0-3 month onesies that we bought prior to his arrival, so it was nice to see them on him and fitting. Below is a picture of Ian that we took during our visit Thanksgiving morning. He's such a sweet baby.

He is still bringing up gastric juices, but it must be decreasing because they keep bringing up his feeds (through the feeding tube). He's gone from 9 cc's to 12 cc's every hour over the past couple of days. For the past two days I've increased my number of pumping sessions from one to four, in anticipation of him needing more breastmilk. So far I am keeping up, actually pumping more than what he is consuming, but my current health issues are making it difficult to continue pumping, so I'm not as consistent as I need to be to continue increasing and sustaining milk supply. I am praying and changing my lifestyle (with the help of my sweet husband) to change it though.

I can't wait to see the family again for the Christmas holiday, just hoping that our baby boy will finally be home with us by then. His absence in our house is  really eating away at us. Until then, Fluff still continues to be an absolute joy and blessing, like balm to our hearts. Here is a picture we took tonight just before bedtime.