Gains and Losses

I topped the seven pound mark recently and continue to gain weight at an astonishing clip. In my first month of life, I've already gained about 2.5 pounds. If I keep this pace up, I'll gain 30 pounds a year, which means I'll weigh about 300 pounds by the time I'm ten years old. That may seem like a lot until you factor in that I grow about an inch a month -- or a foot a year. When I'm ten, I'll be about 11.5 feet tall, so the 300 pounds won't make me seem fat at all.

I continue to eat at an excellent clip. I've recently set new a breast feeding consumption record of 30cc eclipsing my old mark of 22ccs. I'm now on ad lib feeding which means I eat as much as I want when I want. Actually, the latter is not quite true. If I don't get up every four hours, I'm awakened - grrrr - and made to eat. Still, I like all this new freedom.

I had a painful experience today. I was circumcised - ouch! They used the Plastibell method with extra anesthetic around my "affected area." I hated this. It was my most painful experience since birth. Happily though, I'm zoned out on children's Tylenol, so things are not as bad as they might be.

In other scary news, there's another Aidan in the IICN! Fearing that he was named after the Sex and the City character, my parents checked out his name origins. Supposely, his parents came across the name as a character in a book and liked it. So for now, I'll attribute this to coincidence rather than the dreaded Sex and the City effect.

It's a boy?

Scientists have discovered a new test to predict the sex of a child a mere 16 days from conception. It took my parents several months to figure out that I was a boy.

Look Ma, No Feeding Tube!

It's been over 24 hours since I declared independence from gavage by ripping out my feeding tube. I've managed to keep it out by taking every feeding either through nursing or via the bottle. Let me tell you, they don't make it easy. In an evil plan to put the tube back in, my Mommy and the nurses decided to give me a bath yesterday afternoon. Baths really tire me out. To me, they're like running a marathon with all the involuntary arm flailing and assorted other stuff. Plus, they're too relaxing at the end. They put me in the mood to sleep through many feedings. They took a Polaroid of me to commemorate the event. Maybe someone will help me scan and post this picture. Who knew that Polaroids still existed!

Anyway, along comes the 5:30 feeding and I'm still completely tuckered out. Both my parents try with limited success to get food in me. Well, the nurses haul out the heavy artillery, so to speak, in their effort to speed the exit of me, the boring boy. They send in a nurse names Suzy to feed me. Now Suzy is a large Russian woman, a sort of mother earth made flesh. You just know that she was born with the ability to bend the will of infants to her ends. Well, she's determined to get me to eat. First, she wakes me up with the dreaded cold wet cloth in the face treatment. You know I didn't like that, but I did wake up, if only briefly. The rest of the time she variously prods, massages, burps, and otherwise cajoles me into taking the feeding. By 6:40 I'm finished. In the words of the old Alka-Seltzer ads, I can't believe I ate the whole thing.

What's in a Name?

A trip to the Institute for Naming Children Humanely reveals that none of my names fall afoul of the many pitfalls outlined there.

Boring Boy

Got back the results from a whole batch of tests today. My bili levels are down in the 7s and the rest of my readings are good, so it seems like I'm becoming, as they say in the hospital, a boring little kid. Boring kids don't get to stay long, so I'd be quite happy to claim this moniker. To celebrate, I ripped the gavage tube out of my nose and flung it across the room. The nurse intitially wanted to put it back, but my parents persuaded her to hold off. Their confidence proved well founded as I nippled my entire 5:30 pm feeding. Flushed with that success, I then rolled through the night, nippling all my feedings up through the present time. I do NOT want that tube put back in.

I'm getting more vocal these days. Here is a top five list of my favorite noises to make:

1. Eh.
2. Ugh.
3. Baa-aaa-aaa (like a sheep)
4. Eeeep (high pitched like a mouse)
5. Ahhhhhh (standard infant cry)

Some day, if I'm feeling really ambitious, I'll have my daddy bring in his computer and digitize some of my noises, so you can hear them!

Gavage

The term gavage, which is how I eat some of my food, has an odd and interesting history. Apparently, it is a term used by the French mostly to describe the practice of force feeding geese, so that they turn into a foie gras. From the Oxford English Dictionary comes this reference:

1963 L. DURRELL in Holiday Jan. 70/1 In goose country, where the practice of force-feeding geese (gavage) is in operation, there are always a goodly number of casualties.

Here is a funny web site making light of this practice.

The earliest reference to gavage as a way of feeding preemies like me comes from the good Doctor Turnier of Paris. Here's the reference:

1889 Buck's Handbk. Med. Sci. VIII. 102/2 Dr. Turnier, of Paris, has advocated the method of gavage in infants prematurely born.

I hope they don't still use Buck's Handbook of Medical Science in caring for me even now!

Bradycardias
Although I have not had any lately, I'm prone to have bradycardias -- sudden slowings of my heart rate. These sometimes come when I eat too fast and forget to coordinate sucking, breathing, and swallowing. Apparently, the President has a similar problem as related in this story contributed by alert reader Dave. Makes me feel I'm in good company with my problem with bradys after gagging.

I got hopeful news yesterday. Some of the nurses are starting to talk openly about my going home. I'm able to nipple (in one form or another) pretty much every feeding without any great difficulty. Moreover, we switched bottles yesterday from the Haberman, which is really mostly for preemies and kids with eating problems, to the Avent feeding bottles. I had no difficulty whatsoever adapting to the change. In fact, my Daddy, who is ridiculously awkward at this stuff gave me the bottle and despite his best efforts I still managed to do my entire feeding.

On the bilirubin front, I'm due for some more tests today, but I still look yellowish. The nurses speculate that I may have something called breast milk jaundice. Does not seem to be anything to worry about too much though.

I'm a real fashion plate around the IICN thanks to all the lovely outfits people have gotten me. The nurses continually crow over the variety of cute outfits I have. Yesterday, I wore a flopsy bunnies outfit with footies. Unfortunately, my own legs are still a little to short to reach the end of the footies, so I was a flopsy bunny myself. It's nice that Beatrix Potter's stuff is all on etext!

I had a bath today. I've decided that baths are not bad things at all though they're very tiring. I was supposed to eat afterwards, but I was so sleepy I went promptly to dreamland and instead enjoyed a gavage. Food is always good when you don't have to be conscious for it. My other feedings went better than this. Otherwise, my situation is little changed. When I can eat, I get to go home. Of course, hanging out at the hospital with everyone responding to my every whim has its advantages! Still, it would be neat to see what outside looks like. I understand that today this outside place was rainy. Water falling from the sky --- how odd.

Sad news -- speed eating did not work out for me. Yesterday, I had bradys during two speed eating sessions. These were my first in five days. Still, everyone is encouraged by how infreqeunt they are becoming. Sucking, swallowing and breathing all at the same time sure is complex.

Drat. My tear ducts are still all jammed up. As a result, I have these large hardened tear gobs on my eyelashes and the edges of my eyes. They've been giving me some drops for this, but the duct remain stubbornly clogged. Yesterday, they decided to employ a stronger medicine -- topicla erythromycin. This stuff has the effect of being like lip gloss -- only for my eyelids.

My bilirubin also remains stubbornly high. I still have a nice bronzed look. For now, the doctors have not decided to put me under the lights.

I got to see my father yesterday. This was really great. He and I were both quite tired at the end of my feeding so we took a nap together. He behaved himself very well -- not fussy or whiny in the least. My eating is continuing to improve.

I've put up some new pictures on my website. These were mostly taken around the time of my bath last Saturday. I look exceptionally cute with doe-like eyes in one of the shots. By the way, I notice that some of you are writing COMMENTS in that section of my weblog. You should check back on your comments sometimes since I've answered some of them. It's nice to have so much attention paid to me!

I have had another big growth spurt--I now weigh 6 pounds, 8 ounces! I also have longer wakeful periods these days. I like to trick Mom by acting sleepy just before she is about to leave, then I perk up and open my big, beautiful eyes and bat my eyelashes. This tactic never fails to keep her around longer.

My bilirubin has been slowly creeping up again. Today it was 9.8. The doctor says that I can handle that level at my present size, so I am not going back under the bililights at this point. They are just monitoring my levels closely.

In happier news, I have now had 3 days in a row without a bradycardia! Hooray!!

Tomorrow Daddy will get back from Philadelphia. I can't wait to see him!

Mommy gave me a bath today. I was a lot less upset at being wet this time-- a guy could get used to baths. Mom says she predicts that I'll take after my father and wind up spending whole evenings in the tub once I'm old enough to bathe myself!

I had to gave my gavage tube replaced again. I hate having that thing stuck to my cheek with adhesive. I enjoy touching my face-- epecially my cheeks-- and I yank on the gavage tube whenever I can get my hands on it. Unfortunately, I cannot seem to rid myself of it. When I succeed at yanking off the adhesive, the nurses just tape it back down or-- even worse-- replace the gavage tube altogether. I was extremely distressed when the nurse removed my old tube from my nose and put a new one in today. Mommy felt very bad for me when I cried, and she cuddled me for a long time afterward until I fell asleep.

Despite the fact that I have not yet gotten the hang of eating on my own, I am becoming a sturdy little guy. I now weigh 6 pounds, 4 ounces-- a pound and 6 oz. more than weighed at birth. The staff at the hospital is also quite impressed at my taste in clothes, and I am enjoying modeling my extensive wardrobe for them.

My 2001 tax deduction status is now official since I have been assigned a social security number. I now exist to the US government; it remains to be seen whether I will still be happy about this when I grow up!

Lots of new photos up on the site. They're scattered through all of the existing directories, so you'll have to go and search through all of them to see the new stuff.

I continue to improve at eating. Yesterday's two nursing sessions saw me consume 16ccs and 14ccs, respectively. I think I've now moved up to another level (the mid-teens in ccs). On the bottle front, I am regularly able to take my full meal (50ccs) this way.

On the downside, I had my bili levels tested and they're starting to trend up. The latest test came back 9 and change, which is up from 7 when I was tested more than a week ago. So far, I don't have to go back under the lights to improve my tan, but I'll keep you posted should I need to return to the George Hamilton lifestyle. Oddly, there is a rock band named Bilirubin. I'll bet they like being under the lights!

Tomorrow and Wednesday will be the first days in my entire life that I will not get to see my father. He's flying across the country to the Wharton School to try to get a job. I hope he succeeds. He's going to need a job to keep me in Pampers in the coming years!

It was a very busy day for me today. In the morning, my parents talked to a doctor about how I'm doing. He seems to think that the bradys and so on were not a big deal at all and that once I learn how to eat, I'll get to go home. He thinks maybe 10 to 14 days until that happens. Some nurses continue to note my bronze complexion, so the doctor has ordered a new bilitest for me. Results on Monday or Tuesday.

I nursed for a record three times today! My intake was hghest on the first go at 16ccs. Three hours later, I got 10ccs, then at night only 6 ccs. My overall consumption was the highest one day total ever. In between my first two feedings, I had my first bath. At first I was not too sure that I exactly liked bathing. For one thing, to bathe, one needs to be naked, and I got cold and cranky at this prospect. Eventually I settled in a bit better. After my bath was over and my hair dried, I sported a nifty "sticky-uppie" hairdo. I look really cute (at least I think I must look really cool since I was bombarded by a zillion flash photos from my parents).

Well, after all the excitement, I was pretty tired. Shortly after my afternoon feeding I was out like a light. In fact, I was so zonked, you could pick me up and hold me upside down by my feet and I still wouldn't mind. (Thankfully, no one tried this experiment to find out though.) I think my low intake at night mostly had to do with how tired I was from the day's activities.

Since both my tear ducts are blocked up, I now get drops for my eyes. The drops seem to improve things although, much like a hamster, my eyes tend to get glued shut from time to time. How annoying. That's about it. My site has now had over 500 hits! Thanks for visiting it so often. My friends at Geocities sent me an e-mail telling me that over the last few days, I had one of the hottest sites in their domain. Amazing really.

I have posted some new photographs to my website. They are in the Jan 1 directory.

Yesterday was a banner day for me eating-wise -- I set a new consumption record of 22ccs from nursing last night. Amazingly, after all that work, I still had enough energy to fuss as my parents were tucking me in for the night. This bought me an extra fifteen minutes at least of love and affection. A cunning plan on my part, I think.

The only downside is that my complexion seems to be a bit more bronzed than in days past, and at least one of the nurses worried that perhaps my bili level has started to climb again. That being said, I'm very alert and active and not at all a sleepy guy, so maybe I'm still okay. They're planning some tests to see what's going on.

Today, I'm going to have my first bath. I know my father absolutely adores baths (in fact, that's about all he talks to me about), so I'm looking forward to my first one. Of course, my Coppola-esque production crew will be on hand to record and photograph each minute of the experience, so you'll soon get to see how it went.

I have posted a brand new batch of photos to my website. These are located in the album labeled "Jan 7 to Jan 18". I attained a new weight milestone yesterday -- I now weigh 2600 grams (as compared to my birth weight of 2218g)! I don't really know my metric system yet, but using the handy converter I discovered that I weigh 5 pounds and 12 ounces! I did pretty well nursing yesterday taking 10ccs on each go. The lactation consultant was very pleased that I had migrated from non-nutritive sucking to nutritive sucking. I ran across an odd experiment that tries to use non-nutritive sucking as a way to see whether babies can discriminate between different languages.

I'm doing well at learning how to express myself in many ways. One of the things I seem to have learned how to do is pout. I'm also more vocal than I was two weeks ago. Now, when I'm unhappy, I no longer bleat like a lamb. That being said, the nurses still think of me as one of the mellowest babies in the ICN. My parents are both hoping that the mellow California vibe will stay with me throughout my childhood. Today, my parents may get to give me my first bath! I'm looking forward to it! Of course, I'll have pictures of the event to share with you guys.

I could not get the archive to work at the geocities site, so I moved to blogspot. Note that the new address of my weblog is aidanmorgan.blogspot.com. Please adjust your bookmarks. This page is, of course still reachable from my home website.

Hi! I've added many new items to my website and reorganized it slightly. The picture is now forced a bit to the left to avoid the nasty Yahoo ad, which was obscuring it. I've also added a section with news and links that are interesting to me. I've also added a guestbook. Finally, I now have my OWN initials for my weblog!

Note to all: I am not named after the Sex and the City character Aidan Shaw! In fact, my parents did not even know there was such a character in Sex and the City since they don't watch the show. What I do have in common with this character is (as the copy on the web site puts it) that I too am "irresistibly charming, with laid-back sex appeal - witness the slow smile, the twinkle in his eyes..."

Actually, the slow smile is a tough one for me at this age since I've not yet developed the fine motor skills needed to smile when I want to.

One of my greatest concerns is that somehow so many people who watch the show will also be smitten by Aidan's laid-back sex appeal that they will decide to name their little boys after him and, heaven forbid, Aidan will become a trendy name. Oh God, I don't want to have the name that is to the 2000s what Jason was to the 1980s. The ridiculous popularity of the name Jason was made light of in the popular naming book, Beyond Jennifer and Jason. I hope the next edition is not subtitled beyond Ashley and Aidan.

Interestingly, the actor playing the Aidan character on Sex and the City, John Corbett, is perhaps most famous as the character Chris on the now defunct show Northern Exposure. Despite widespread expectations at the time the show folded that Rob Morrow, the lead in the series, would go on to the widest future fame. In fact, John Corbett has easily been the most commercially successful of the Northern Exposure cast. Here's an amusing connection -- Rob Morrow was in the same line as my parents when they went to see the Merchant-Ivory film Howard's End in New York City. While waiting in the line, Morrow seemed pushy and impatient.

I'm also not named after the actor Aidan Quinn although my mother finds those famous eyes incredibly arresting. I secretly suspect that she would swap my Daddy for Aidan Quinn in a heartbeat should the opportunity present itself.

I'm still having trouble with bradycardias. Yesterday I had three of them -- one of which was severe enough that I needed moderate stimulation from a nice nurse to set my heart rate back to its usual 140 beats per minute. My mother spoke to the doctor yesterday about how I'm doing. He said, and I quote, "I’m a good little preemie", which I thought was very nice of him to say. He also explained that my bradys were the product of my having an immature brainstem and that I would probably outgrow them in a couple of weeks.

My eating habits are changing too as I get a little older. The hospital people like me to eat on an exact schedule -- once every three hours -- sort of like being in the military. Well, yesterday I decided to rebel (and not my usual Gandhi-like passive, non-violent resistance). Around 7pm last night, I started rooting around and fussing a whole lot. Dinner (or whatever meal this is) was not scheduled for another hour, but I didn't care. My behavior induced one of the nurses to call my mother and father and tell them to get their butts into the hospital to feed me. They were already on their way, so I didn't have to wait long. One of the nurses said that my insurrection could lead to my being put on something called ad lib feeding, where I get to choose when to eat. Hooray! Sweet victory!

Last night I ate 10ccs in the evening through nursing. The morning was a bit of a disaster. I was frustrated, my Mom was frustrated, everyone was frustrated. For some reason I was busy sucking away but getting little reward. Ugh. I hate it when that happens.

I'm getting much better at eating. Yesterday was a record setting day with two nursing sessions where I took in a whopping 14ccs in each session. This is a new consumption record for me, eclipsing the previous mark (10ccs) by a ton. I attribute my improved success at this to my better focus and concentration. I can now nurse more than 30 minutes without falling asleep.

I'm annoyed. One of my tear ducts seems to be blocked and this causes my left eye to glue itself shut. Happily, people come by and unglue it from time to time soI can see in stereo, but it's still annoying. Otherwise, not much else new with me. I was barraged with picture taking last night. Amazingly, even when my eyes are completely closed, I flinch from a flash. I know I'm cute, but enough with the flashes already. That's about it.

Last night was an up and down night for me. I had a bradycardia that was severe enough that I needed a nice nurse to help me to recover. This really scared my parents -- scared me too. I wish my central nervous system would hurry up and get fully developed. On the upside, I took 6ccs of breast milk last night. This is the thrid highest total I've ever taken. I have to work hard for this stuff, so usually I like to have a long sleep immediately thereafter.

I find my arms endlessly interesting. I like to watch them as I make a who series of tai chi movements with them. Round and round in the air they go. Which position next? Who knows. I've also found that my arms can be useful, though I don't quite have the hang of them. I know they're good for reaching out to get stuff I want, but often when I reach out, I forget to unstraighten my arm, and the stuff stays at arm's length from me. I find this frustrating and sometimes get upset about it. Overall though, I really like my arms.

Hi. I'm Aidan. This is my first blog entry. I now weigh 5 pounds, 5 ounces. I've been gaining weight lately. I'm doing it all naturally -- just with breast milk -- no additives or other supplements are required to help bulk me up. I'm still trying to get the hang of eating. Today, I managed to take in 2 ccs of breast milk through nursing. Since I'm supposed to have 40ccs per sitting, I still only get a small amount of my food intake this way. On the other hand, I've got the use of a bottle down cold. Last night I took 50ccs -- my full meal -- through a Haberman bottle , which is a special kind of bottle that makes me have to work harder to get food out -- just like nursing.

Sometimes I eat too fast and have bradycardias. Happily, I'm almost always able to snap out of these all by myself. Otherwise, I'm doing just fine. The nurses and doctors say that I'm progressing well for my age, but that I should expect to spend a bit more time in the intermediate intensive care nursery before I go home.