Less Episodes - June 2nd, 2016

You did not have any episodes over night. When I fed you this morning for your 9 am feed, you did not have any episodes either. You took 23 ml for me. The nurse told me that you now weigh 6 lb, 9 oz.
The doctors rounded shortly after I fed you. They said that they wanted to increase your feeds to 65 ml every 3 hours to make up for the decrease in calories (yesterday they changed you from 24 cal to 22 cal). They are going to continue to watch you to make sure that you are not straining when trying to go to the bathroom, and if you are, they are going to give you more prune juice. Other than that, there wasn't any other changes.
For your noon feed, speech came to take a listen to you. You are getting out of breath when you take a few sucks from the bottle. After you suck a few times, you have to catch your breath. She said that eventually you will get the hang of it, but it may take some maturing before that happens. She said that she wanted to listen the whole time that I fed you because she wanted to make sure she wasn't missing anything. After listening to you, she said she still does not feel the need for a swallow study. She thinks you will get the hang of it eventually, it just may take a bit. I asked her if we should try to bottle feed every other feed since you are getting tired, but she said she doesn't think so. She said that she thinks what we need to do is stop you once you start having to catch your breath, take a one minute break, and then see if you want to eat more. If you do, great, and if you don't, that is good as well. The goal is to stop you from having episodes, not having you eat a lot. Obviously we want you to eat more and more, but our number one goal is to stop the episodes from happening.
I held you for a while and you were sound asleep. Unfortunately I had to put you back in your crib so I could go home. I can't wait until I don't have to leave you at night. It is definitely rough, even after so long.
I called the hospital a few times after I left and they didn't answer. I finally got a hold of them just now. For your 3 pm feed you took 25 ml, at 6 pm you tool 38 ml, and at 9 pm you took 22 ml. You had no events for your 3 and 6 pm feeds, but at 9 you had two events that you quickly resolved on your own. Your heart rate dropped to 73 and 77. I am assuming after hearing how much you took at your 3 and 6 pm feeds that you were tired for your 9 pm feed. Hopefully you don't have anymore events over night.
We love you and hope you have a good night. We are proud of you every day and we hope you learn how to eat better soon. We are here for you no matter how long it takes! Can't wait to see you in the morning!