More Food!

They weren't kidding when they said we would go slow with feeding, but we're still very pleased with everything that's happening. Philip is now getting 15ml of  breastmilk every 3 hours and we will continue to increase that amount by 5ml each day (as long as he doesn't puke or get diarrhea), until he reaches 60ml every 3 hours (they consider that "full feeds"). Once he gets to full feeds we'll wait a couple of days to see what he does, and as long as he tolerates it well we'll get to take him home. 


So if everything goes perfectly we could have him home in as few as 12 days - though the docs like to warn us that gastroschisis babies "typically" start to have trouble when we approach the full feed mark. Considering those same doctors told us he had an atresia that would require us to close him up, wait 6-8 weeks without feeding, then reopen him to possibly make an ostomy or g-tube, I've decided to keep positive and let our Super Baby prove them wrong AGAIN!  


Its frustrating because his bowel is tolerating the feed increases so well that most of the time when he eats he just gets mad because its not enough. We've spent a lot of time lately trying to calm and soothe him, but I know how mad I get when I'm hungry and if someone told me I could only have 1 potato chip in a whole bag, I'd be pissed too. Poor Baby. 


Check out his new digs! (now that we're just trying to feed, there's no more need for the big, scary ICU bed):