One Whole Pound

My strong little man is growing like a weed now.  He is gaining weight everyday, and as of today, he has gained one entire pound over his birth weight!  He is now 3 pounds 15 ounces, so I am guessing he will be over 4 pounds tomorrow.  I'm so excited and so glad that he is digesting his milk well and growing big and strong!

He is still pretty dependent on the CPAP to breathe, so the doctors are going to wait until he is 34 weeks to try and take him off, or put him on a high flow cannula.  Right now, we don't know if his difficulties are simply due to immaturity, or are being caused by his PDA (one of the holes in his heart).  We are still praying that the PDA will close on its own so that no further action will be needed, and that his lungs will continue to develop and be strong enough to breathe without support.  We will just have to wait and see how he is doing at 34 weeks (about 2 1/2 weeks from now).   

He is also having an eye exam on Monday, but not the kind of eye exam you or I would get.  This is not a typical, let's see if you need glasses, type of exam.  This is to determine if he has retinopathy of prematurity (ROP), which is abnormal growth of blood vessels in the eye.  I don't know much about this, but if my baby does appear to have it, I will explain it, and what is to be done, in more detail.  But right now, I'm just going to pray that everything looks good!  Thank you SO much for your continued prayers for our little boy!  That is the thing that he needs more than anything right now, and it means so very much to us.