Pushed Too Far.....

Well, I was up at the hospital over my lunch break and Henry was sound asleep! He is still doing very well, considering. He is now 3 lbs. 5 oz. and lung, heart, bowel function remains normal. Last week Dr. Kim decided to reduce his oxygen flow (thru cannula) from 3 L/min to 1 L/min. The cannula is used to allow a steady flow of oxygen for his lungs. Henry did not appreciate this change too much. He started to have an increased number of "bradys" (heart rate drops) toward the end of last week and they decided to bump the oxygen back up to 3 L/min. Dr. Kim is notorious (so the nurses say) for trying to "push" preemies by allowing them to work harder on their own. Well, Henry wasn't quite ready to work that hard yet! We haven't been able to hold him because of this for the past 3 days. Jenny has not been happy about it.....but understands that he is exhausted from last week. I talked to Dr. Arcellana today and he said there is nothing except for his "tiredness" that is causing the heart rate drops. He then said....."I think it is just Henry being Henry!" Thought that was kinda funny. Nurse Sarah said Henry had the largest poop she has ever seen last night. It was 51 grams! So if I did my math right....his last poop was roughly 3% of his body weight! hahaha!
Henry also had another head ultrasound last weekend, and everything came back normal. I also go to see the opthamologist check Henry's retnia the other day. That was not fun to watch! Glad Jenny was not in the room! I guess a normal retina has blood vessels which grow to the front of the eye, but a preemie does not have completely developed vessels and they want to monitor the growth to make sure there is no abnormal vessel growth around the retina. He literally stuck what looked like a steel ice pick in his eye and moved the eye ball around. The doc then said, "oh don't worry, he can't feel that." hahahahaha! They will check his eyes again in a few weeks.
All the nurses say Henry is cute as a button and looking more like a little man every day! Not sure if they are just saying that....but it is fun to hear at the least! Thanks again for the continued thoughts and prayers!!!