One month at home!

Sydney has been home for a month and what a month it was! We're really learning to understand her and what her various cries and actions really mean. She's also interacting so much more with us and she loves to play the smiling game with us. It's been so good to see her progress the way she has.

We went to see the neurologist yesterday and she was happy with Sydney's development so far but did note that she does need to complete her occupational and physical therapy. She has some sensory issues primarily related to the fact that she spent such a long time in the hospital being touched a certain way and being in that environment. She likes having her hair gently rubbed but she absolutely does like for anyone to hold her head or for anything at all to be on it. She also has a very strong reaction to her feet being held because in the hospital that usually meant that they were about to take blood from her heel. If you hold her feet now, she immediately tenses up and cries. Her vision is improving in the right eye and she's focusing better but she does focus the left eye first and then the right and not both at the same time. This is something we expect to improve over time especially with her using the patch. She's doing great with all her other developmental milestones and the doctor was impressed with everything else that she was able to do. I cannot tell you how many times doctors commented yesterday that she's really doing so well in light of all the odds that were against her based on her gestational age at birth. Her head circumference measurement was right where it needs to be but the doctor did stress the need for her to have another MRI by the time she is 6 months adjusted because babies brains do grow and develop rapidly during the first 6 months of life.

This past weekend she had some major reflux episodes and on Monday night I noticed some blood in her spit-up. It was old blood and not bright red but blood nonetheless. The neurologist was also concerned and tried to get in the see the Gastrointestinal (GI) doctor yesterday but they had no open appointments. Thankfully the Medical Center was right next door to their Childrens' research hospital so they referred us over there and that's where we spent the entire day. Little Miss even got her very own infant sized hospital gown. It was sooo cute! I only got a pic with my camera phone since we left the regular camera at home because we were not expecting a trip to the hospital. I'll try to post those pictures tomorrow.

We did all kinds of tests, XRays and blood work and everything came back fine but they did say that her tummy is irritated from all the spitting up and all the acid build up was making it worse. This means that her stomach and throat don't have time to heal before she spits up again. She seems to be getting past the spitting up on demand and now appears to be fighting it coming back up. Poor baby. We've been incident free since Monday and that is a very long stretch for us. Please pray that we're nearing the end of her battle with reflux and that she will be totally healed.

We're less than 36 hours away from moving. Please also pray that Little Miss does well during the trip and also remains reflux free.

Shout out: Congrats on the new addition to your family, Ryan and Devie!