Information as of: 8/8/03

• Actual Age: 2 months and 6 days old (9 weeks 3 days)
• Gestational Age: 32 weeks and 3 days (this is how far along I am if I was still in my mommy's belly)
• Corrected Age: -1 months and 25 days (this is how old I am if I had been born on mommy's due date, Oct. 1 2003)
• Weight: 1441 grams or about 3 pounds 3 ounces* I finally got rid of most of my fluids and this is probably my real weight!
• Length: 32.25 cm
• Head Circumference: 26.5 cm
• Current Issues my doctors are working on:
  • Lungs:
    Even though they are better than they used to be, I am still on the Conventional Vent. I will probably be on the vent till they fix my belly (see below). I currently have moderate-mild chronic lung disease. This means I will might have asthma when I get older and get colds easier. See, my lungs will keep growing till I am age 3! So, while I have immature lungs right now, I will have time to recover. My lungs will never look like other people's, but they will be normal for me! Mommy knows lots of kids with asthma who didn't have all the problems I do! So, if that is the only lasting effect, that isn't too bad! Well, my steriods help lower the settings on my vent and I am now on minimal settings. I keep trying to extubate myself, but I am not ready to extubated right now.
  • Belly:
    My belly got a tear in it when my bowels stopped working because I had a bad infection! But, the doctors made me better from the infection and my tear healed itself. BUT, when I healed, I got a scar that is now blocking part of my bowels. So, now I will have to have surgery-- but luckily not for a few more weeks. I will be sick for awhile after the surgery, but I am a fighter and will fight hard afterwords. There is a chance that long term I will have trouble getting all my nutrition (short bowel syndrom) and mommy and daddy will have to make me eat a lot or my growth could be stunted! But, the surgery will otherwise fix my bowels so that when I am in kindergarten, I shouldn't be any different than my friends! The doctors are talking about setting the bowel surgery for the first week or so in August. Well, the doctors "super sized" my food and now my fluids came under control (you need proteins to process fluids and my proteins were low). See, I am now eating more than Adults do! They say there is no medical reason for it, so they think my metablosim is just really high! Now, they think it will take them about 10 more days to get me where they want me and then I will have my belly surgery! Looks like it might be the middle-end of August till the surgery happens.
  • Brain:
    Well, in this area we just got some concerning news. After my 7 week ultrasound, we found out that my body is growing faster than my brain (between my 5 week ultrasound and 7 week ultrasound I got my first growth spurt)! This might be a beign phenomeon because I was so very small where my brain will eventually catch up (they say about 24 months of age). It could also be indicative of some brain injury (though if it is, we can't tell for sure or have any idea how much). Or, it could be a progressive issue where the brain will get worse. So, with only one ultrasound showing this (we could tell because there was more fluid between my skull and my brain than there was in the last ultrasound), all we really know is that I am still at risk (some babies like me have completely normal ultrasounds all the way through but have severe problems anyways as they grow up and some kids who have one or more concerning ultrasounds turn out normal) and we won't know whether I will have problems until I start missing milestones (things I should do at certain times like sitting up and crawling). If it is progressive, we might know when I get my next ultrasound in about 1 1/2 weeks. So, I will definitely need some more time to catch up to other kids my age, but there is still chance I will catch up with my peers. Well, we just got the 9 week ultrasound results and good news. My brain is maturing normally in the past few weeks (for example, the ridges in the brain and such are developing). They shouldn't be able to see how much my brain has matured, but I do still have some extra fluid between my brain and my skull that allows them to see it. But, they said that the ultrasound looks better than the last. So, now they think there is just an anomoly that my brain is growing at a different rate than my skull. They are hopefull it will even out evenually and that it is not much to worry about. Though we still won't really know till I do or don't hit milestones!
  • Eyes:
    My eyes are open now! They were closed (fused shut) when I was born. I might have something called ROP. Lots of preemies have it. It means that I could be blind- but that most likely I will just have to have laser surgery and wear glasses. Well, they finally saw something. Right now I do NOT have ROP. BUT, I will probably still get it because my eyes are still growing. So, I am only going to have eye exams every other week now! I will have them weekly again if/when I develop ROP!