This was a bit of a rough week. I convinced the doctor to try Aiden at a half dose of the human fortified milk (HMF) as he was really not doing well on the 20ml dose. I am having a very hard time with the HMF. They give it to preemies to increase their growth rate and give them more vitamins and minerals as they burn through so much more than a standard newborn. However, the HMF is hard on their gut, Aiden in particular… well i’m surprised he has allergies on both sides of his family! The HMF constipates a lot of babies, but so far it does the opposite for Aiden. He poops soooo much, has horrible gas, spits up, and is so uncomfortable and unhappy. After Aiden puked up his morning meds and feed all down both of us, I put my foot down.

That day was a rough day. When Aiden puked, up came his caffeine dose. I really had no idea how much he needed that until he didn’t have it. (they couldn’t re- dose him because they didn’t know how much he had puked up) Without the stimulation from the caffeine Aiden became very lethargic. I was holding him and he oxygen saturation and heart rate kept dipping. He was just limp in my arms. We had to keep him in the incubator all day and increase his air support back up to get him through the day. I couldn’t hold him at all as he would relax more and then just set all the alarms off. After this incident and talking with the evening nurse, we split up Aiden’s meds as well to make it easier on his tummy. He now gets his caffeine and sodium at 9am, and then his iron and probiotics at 12pm. This was there’s less chance of him puking up his caffeine again!

The next day Aiden was back to himself. But that afternoon we had another setback. His feed pump had malfunctioned earlier and didn’t start. The nurse was trying to get Aiden back on his feed schedule reducing times between his feeds…. this did not go well! You take a tiny baby that already gets fed a huge amount and try and feed it again just after the other feed. It was horrible. Halfway through Aiden’s feed he started getting fussy. It got worse and worse until he just kept crying. He was so overfull and so uncomfortable. I was beyond upset and frustrated because his feed should have been stopped. I don’t care he gets less on one feed, he was clearly in distress. Well they wouldn’t stop his feed, so he eventually puked up a good 1/4 of his feel all down both of us… im sure getting broken into the getting puked on part of parenthood. He was sure happier after that. I find one of the hardest things about the NICU is not really having a say. You have to fight your battles on what you want to put your foot down on and sometimes you get somewhere, and sometimes not. Having to watch things you don’t agree with and then watch your baby suffer is extremely hard to do. You just have to trust that they have done this 1000 times and now whats best.

Then the next day… Aiden was good… but I fell apart. Its just been one thing after the next this week. BC Health orders bring back mask mandates. I come walking into the NICU and am handed a mask and told we have to wear them. I was in complete shock and instantly crumbled into a crying disaster. If there isn’t enough stress this was the last thing i needed to be added to the pile. I was absolutely devastated at the fact Aiden would not see my face for the next 2-3 months. When i looked into the incubator at him, he gave me this weird look back. He was just at the point of really starting to respond to our facial expressions and now that was stripped away. I am not joking when I say i sat there googling every possible alternative of where we could move to not have to wear a mask. I searched for in home NICU care – nope doesn’t exist. I looked up Alberta NICU’s. I know Aiden is suppose to be still in me and wouldn’t see my face usually, but he’s here, and he’s interacting with us and I was just heartbroken. After an immense amount of stress and crying a nurse came up to me and said, i just checked and confirmed – parents don’t need to wear masks, just staff! Wow was that a relief, but by this point I was so exhausted from the previous hour that I could just hardly process anything. George was sure excited for that news to, because he was so concerned i was going to make a snap decision about moving somewhere else, after finally getting settled here.

Then on day 18 in the NICU, we finally had some good news. Aiden got to move to the Blue Room! This was a huge surprise to us and a big milestone in the NICU. We were currently in the red room, which is for the most critical and smallest babies. The blue room is for the babies that are a bit bigger, on less support and is one step closer to going home! I was an exciting move.

Not much else happened this week. Our focus is on growth. Aiden continues to do well. He interacts with us more and more each day, and its so exciting to go so his little smiles every day.