First days home...

We came home on February 18th - a Thursday. On dishcharge, Carson weighed 8#9oz. Our first night home was a little rough... my milk hadn't come in yet and all Carson wanted to do was eat... I tried getting him to eat, but it wasn't satisfying for him. He would take a pacifier, but he kept spitting it out since it wans't what he really wanted. He started the night in his room in the bassinet, but I was in there probably 4-5 times before midnight and finally I was so exhausted, I told Richie that I was going to bring Carson into bed with me so I could sleep next to him (don't worry - he was in his snuggle nest so no worries that I'd roll onto him!) and just pop the pacifier in or feed him easily without having to get up out of bed so often. Richie went and crashed in bed with Laura so that at least one of us was getting a good night of sleep. I think I was up every 20 minutes or so doing a pacifier pop or attempting to feed... and finally at 3:30am, I was SO tired... I took Carson out to the living room where my mom was sleeping and asked her to be "on call" for the next few hours so I could try to get some sleep... those next 3 hours were the most heavenly sleep I'd felt in a long time!

We had his first visit with the peds office the next morning. He weighed in at 8#2oz (56%) that morning and was measured at 21.75 inches (95%)

Friday evening, Richie's parents came to visit. Laura was kind of fussy on and off that evening and mentioned that her ear hurt her. She broke down into hysterics just as grandma and grandpa were leaving and we though for sure she was just over tired and that we'd get her in bed and she'd crash for the night. We couldn't have been more wrong... Got her into bed around 9pm and she kept crying - in between sobs we heard "ear hurts" and "mouth hurts"... She had been fighting a cough and green/yellow runny nose for the previous week, so it was at that time we started thinking we were headed for another ruptured ear drum... Gave her some tylenol - that did nothing. She bawled for 2 hours straight. That is the worst feeling as a parent - to know your child is in pain and there is absolutely nothing you can do for them. After about an hour of her crying, I gave her ibuprofen on top of the tylenol. She never had a fever. She kept wanting mommy and then daddy and then mommy and then daddy... and she wouldn't let us sit with her for very long - she wanted us up walking with her. Luckily, she let me rock with her a few times as I was not able to yet carry her around. At 11pm, she was lying with her daddy on the couch just bawling... and then she jumped... and then it was quiet. She passed out and slept for the rest of the night. The pressure had relieved itself and she felt much better. We never heard another word about her ear hurting. I did take her into the peds office the next morning (hey, weren't we just there 24 hours earlier with Carson?) They put her on a 10 day course of amoxicillin.

I really felt sad for Laura - she was dealing with a nasty ear infection on top of trying to figure out how to adjust to having her whole world turned upside down with this new being we refer to as "baby brother"... she had quite a few evenings of being fussy - not sure if it has to do with those two things - or just the normal fact that she's a 2 year old, but I'm glad to say that the past 2 nights have been really good here - less fussyness, eating better, happy girl - and even going to bed without crying :)

Carson and daddy watching the olympics!