Day 36 Postpartum. Vinnnie 'Rocky' Gee.

Vinnie continues to do well and it feels like we are starting to come out the other side. He has responded well to the course of steroids and although the dose has been lowered his oxygen requirements haven't gone up too much. He isn't quite ready to come off CPAP completely yet although I am sure he feels differently! Vinnie is getting extremely irritated with all the tubes and has been very grizzly the last week. Partly due to wind and perhaps also due to the steroids (apparently they make the little ones feel aggressive).

I might have already mentioned this, but I am astounded by how strong Vinnie is! He likes having his head turned to the right and lifts his little head and turns it himself if you lie him facing the wrong way... he does this with a lot of force! If he is lying face down he gets his hands underneath him and does these little press ups. I'm not kidding! The little guy is super strong. Uncommonly strong.

On Thursday morning during ward rounds it came to my attention that Vinnie's right eye was cut and bruised. We are not entirely sure how this happened (perhaps during an eye exam on Tuesday - although not sure why the bruise/cut wasn't apparent until Thursday? Maybe some heavy handling by the night nurse whilst cleaning his eyes? Hmmm... not sure), but Mum and Dad were not too impressed. I think the consultant could see I wasn't overly impressed during my interrogation and he assured me there wasn't an 'eye slasher' on the ward. Anyway, I am sure it looks a lot worse that it actually is and he seems to be healing well.

You can kind of see his poor little eye in this photo... he looks like he has had a round in the ring.

The house renovations are progressing nicely and we are hoping to move home at Easter. I'm looking forward to driving again and regaining my independence (although it has been kind of nice being driven around for the last five weeks!). We're not sure how much longer Vinnie will be at NICU for - up to another six weeks, but hopefully less than that. Some babies get sent home around 37-38 weeks gestation and he is currently 34 weeks... so maybe only a few more weeks if he continues to do well.