Happy Thanksgiving!

We spent this Thanksgiving with my family who came out from Chicago. My parents rented a condo up in Park City for us to all hang out in for a few days during the break. We had tons of fun and wish the break could have lasted longer.

Trevor came home early Tuesday and we rushed to get up to Park City to beat the blizzard. It never came, despite the fact that the news was calling it "the blizzard of 2010". Lamest non-blizzard ever. But our boy did look extra cute all bundled up.  

 

Thompson got to be spoiled with attention by everyone over the break. Like his uncle Jonathan. 

 

And his Grandpa Davis.  

  

 

And of course his Grandma Davis.

 

He also got to meet (and be spoiled by) his aunt and cousin. My sister, her boyfriend, and her little 4 year old drove all the way out from Chicago to spend Thanksgiving with us as well. We were so happy to have them around, especially since my sister went to culinary school and makes awesome food and especially since my nephew is adorable. We were sad they had to leave Friday and will continue to campaign for them to move out here, every though the chances are slim. 

Oh and we discovered that when a 4 year old is done holding a baby, he will just pull his arms out from under said baby without warning. 

But we also discovered that Thompson and Ethan are pretty cute together.

We made/ate lots of good food and watched lots of football. Sometimes even at the same time.

 We played in the snow in our swimming suits.

 Then warmed up in the hot tub on our balcony.

We took advantage of free babysitting and went Black Friday shopping. I may or may not have spent almost 4 hours at the outlet mall. And I may or may not have wanted to spend even more time there.

 

But mostly I just enjoyed spending time with my favorite boys.

A Normal and Healthy Newborn

I think we are finally starting to have a more normal newborn experience. Thompson has been out of the hospital for almost two weeks now, and it looks like he is out for good this time (although we did think that last time).

Thanks to some very mediocre residents (whose primary qualities were overdeveloped egos and underdeveloped knowledge/experience), the first week Thompson was in the hospital was a whole lot of going around in circles. The reason he was admitted to the hospital was because he was breathing too rapidly and his oxygen saturation was too low. The pediatrician assumed it was a virus, but didn't want to just send him home on oxygen until he knew for sure. The doctors at the hospital assumed the same thing, and thought he would just need to be on oxygen for a few days until the respiratory infection cleared up.

As the days passed and he continued to rely on the oxygen, they worried something else was going on since he wasn't getting any better. Because of his blood sugar problems, Thompson had been on a medication to lower his insulin levels, which could also have the side effect of fluid retention. They started to look at his heart and lungs for swelling that might be the cause of the breathing problems. But then they told us there was no fluid in his lungs and his heart looked fine. The residents on his case went back to a respiratory infection - despite the fact that the day before they were telling me it couldn't be a virus because he wasn't getting any better. And they told me they just wanted to send him home on oxygen, hoping it would resolve, not knowing what it even was.

This is what frustrates me about the majority of doctors and makes me very, very grateful for the few truly good ones. It seems easiest for doctors to take the band-aid approach to complicated cases. When our pediatrician (who is one of those exceptional doctors) had him admitted, he specifically told us he could just give us oxygen to take home with us, but there was no reason a newborn should be on oxygen and he wasn't going to do that unless he knew why Thompson needed it.  

I think there is nothing more frustrating than knowing something is wrong with your child, but not knowing what it is. Everything the doctors had said to us just didn't make sense and didn't seem right. Teaching hospitals have their advantages, but after a week of getting nowhere with the residents, we finally asked to just work with the attending directly. The day after we did this, the attending called our pediatrician to set up a plan finally. Our pediatrician suggested calling a pulmonologist for a consult. This was the single greatest and most logical idea that we had heard since we had been there. Why it took so long to decide to bring a lung doctor in to see a baby who was having problems breathing is beyond me.

The pulmonologist who came was one of those rare, amazingly good doctors. I loved that little Indian man. He came in, took the most thorough history of any of the doctors we had seen there, and then in stepped us through his thoughts on the case. Although we had been told that all the tests run on Thompson had been normal, this doctor showed us subtle abnormalities that combined with his symptoms suggested that our little guy was actually leaking fluid into his lungs because of swelling. He told us he needed to get off the medicine and be given diuretics to get rid of all the edema. After he left Trevor and I were so relieved. We felt so good about this diagnosis, and so grateful that this doctor figured it out before it got any worse.

As soon as he started the diuretics and weaned off his medicine, his breathing problems resolved completely and he was out of the hospital in a few days. We didn't know how his glucose levels would be or if he would be able to tolerate coming off of the medication, but he did great and has not had a single problem yet. He seems to have completely outgrown the hypoglycemia and stopping the medication stopped the fluid retention issues as well. Looking back at pictures, we can't believe how puffy he actually looked when he was on the medicine compared to now. We kept telling the doctors he looked a little swollen to us, but they told us it wasn't bad and that he was fine. Although I am annoyed at how long it took things to start happening, we our so glad we trusted our instincts and pushed his doctors to find an answer.

These last 7 weeks have been nothing like we expected. Things could have been so much worse, but we had no idea how many bumps there would be along the way to getting a healthy baby. We are so thankful that for the most part, Thompson is a healthy and normal baby. A little small still for his age, but growing like crazy. If there is one thing this kid has always been good at, its eating and gaining weight. He is 8.5 lbs. and seems so big compared to when he was born. By the way, I can't even imagine being pregnant with or giving birth to a baby as big as he is now, even though that's a normal newborn size.

Hopefully Thompson got a lifetime of doctors/hospital stays out of his system. And just in case anyone was wondering, he is still as cute as ever.

 

A few of his favorite things...

Today Thompson is 4 weeks old. In the short time we have had him we have discovered many of his likes. Here are a few:

1. Hospitals. He likes them enough that he has spent more time in them than at home.  He's back at Primary Children's since Friday for a respiratory virus this time. Good thing he is cute, because he is not exactly making this whole parenting thing easy for us.

 

2. Having his hands up by his face. Swaddle his hands in and he will Houdini his way out just so he can sleep with his hands under his chin or on his cheeks.

3. Having something to hold onto. His pacifier, our clothes, my hair - whatever he can grab. I fear my jewelry wearing days are over.

 

4. Sleeping as noisily as possible. It's pretty cute, except for when it is in the middle of the night.

 

5. Cuddling. This kid is quite the snuggler. I can't say I mind at all.

 

6. Entertaining his parents. We discovered this one time when Thompson was starving and Trevor went to give him a kiss.

 

7. And finally - looking adorable. His very favorite thing to do.