A Day for Kelsea

Happy Mother's Day to all of the mother's out there who are reading this. However, the biggest wish goes out to Kelsea. She has become the most amazing mother I know and I am so happy that God chose her to be Hayden's mom.

What Kelsea has been through and how she has responded over the past 16 months has truly been amazing and a blessing. To watch her hold, cuddle, interact, feed, and comfort our son is such an amazing thing. I know that giving birth to Hayden was a pretty spectacular moment in her life, but there is another one that sticks out that will forever be etched in my mind. I wrote a post about it Ready or Not on 2/15/13. Watching Kelsea spring to action that night to comfort Hayden and support him was such an amazing thing. I see how much she means to him now as he is completely infatuated with her. When I hold him, if she walks by, he will follow her with his eyes until he can't see then he jerks his head around to watch her walk out of the room.

It is great to see the progress he is making. He is deliberately grabbing things, holding on to (and not wanting to let go!!!) many things, responding, smiling, rolling from side to side (still can't roll over because of his "O"), and doing great with his "tummy time" mat. Kelsea has been great helping him with his modified tummy time. He is getting so strong.

Growth Chart App on Phone

After his hernia surgery a month ago and subsequent hospital stay a few days later, Hayden was battling croup as well as his normal breathing and feeding issues. We think we finally beat the croup, but the feeding issues hung around. However, they were different. He was hungry, but anytime he tried to take his bottle, he would suck 2-3 times and then violently shake his head and start crying. We're pretty certain this is related to his two front lower teeth starting to come in. It has impacted his feeds and he doesn't really have a normal amount he takes in a day. Sometimes he will eat 1 oz and other times he has taken 5 oz. Most of the time it is closer to 3 oz. Everybody keeps telling us I shouldn't be concerned about his weight because as long as he is growing and he is having wet diapers and bowel movements, then he is healthy. However, I don't like seeing that his weight is so low according to the charts. I don't like it, but I have accepted it and Kelsea and I are both so thrilled with every oz he gains. As of yesterday, he was 10.47 pounds!

We head back to St. Louis on June 7th for a follow-up appt. with Dr. Warner. It was originally supposed to be the following Friday, but he is going to be out of town. They wanted to move it to a later date, but was able to talk them in to getting us there a week earlier. We are going to possibly discuss and set-up a date for Hayden's surgery so I didn't want to push it back further. We are so excited for the possibility of having it this summer, but also scared knowing that we might have to start over on some things and this could also cause a new and different set of problems.

The reason Dr. Warner wants to move it up (I might have posted this several weeks ago after our last visit) is because his abdomen is getting so big and things are moving back inside. His "O" has changed so much since he was born. My goal is to sometime soon have a post dedicated to his "O" and how it has changed over the past 4 months.

Hayden has really been doing great. We had a rough go at it the first month and a half we were home, but since then, our biggest concerns have been related more to normal baby stuff and first time parent things!

We continue to thank you for your prayers and generous support and love that our friends, family, and even strangers have shown us. I was finally able to find the PDF version of the Herald Whig story. If you weren't able to see it, you can read it by following this link: Hayden's Herald Whig Story.

 

From Church last weekend



From Church last weekend