1 week and counting

Well, what a week this has been. It has been a lot of work, but a lot
of fun. The first nights were a little tough, but we're getting used
to it and figuring out a routine.

Sophie gets fed and changed every 3 hours: noon, 3, 6, 9, midnight,
etc. Stephanie and I have very different sleeping schedules , so we
overlap, and it's working out pretty good, I think. I take my evening
powernap while the girls hang out and Sophie gets her 9 o'clock meds.
Then Stephanie goes to bed around 11. I try to bottle feed Sophie at
midnight to tire her out. She usually goes to sleep during or
immediately after this. Then I have a little free time to nap, work or
trade stocks. For 3am I get her setup with the feeding pump, which is
kinda cool--I'll have to do a post on it some day. Sometimes Sophie
sleeps through this, but not always, and that means I'm up for a while
longer. But by 4:30 or so I'm usually in bed. Stephanie gets up around
5:30 and gets the 6am, 9am and meds taken care of. I get up at 11 or
12, and we share afternoon duties, errands, chores, etc. Sophie is
usually wide awake from 9a-3p, roughly. She hangs out in her crib,
bassinet, or bouncy chairs for a good bit of that. Stephanie has
another full week off, then a week of half days before going back full-
time. Hopefully by then Sophie will be sleeping through most of the
night.

We have learned to distinguish the 3 basic cries: little, just woke
myself up cry that usually means she will settle down and go back to
sleep soon; sometimes this becomes the full-blown, screaming bloody
murder cry, which you know when you hear it; and the (thankfully rare)
something's wrong, urgent wail, which means she just threw up. The
second one is the most important, and it had us perplexed for a while.
But we have learned that it seems to mean she is gassy. If not for
that, she'd hardly ever fuss. We're still working on effective
solutions for it, but the best so far seems to be beating on her.
Usually I can calm her down with that and then she'll take a nap on my
shoulder while I do things, like write this entire post!

We also saw the pediatrician today, and that was good. So far
Sophie doesn't seem to have any ill effects from the vaccines. The
doctor was really nice, seemed very good with Sophie, and is
comfortable handling kids with cardio issues. His office is part of
the Cook Children's Hospital physician's network. And maybe best of
all, it's about 200 yards from our house. Sophie did have a vomit and
turn pale episode in the exam room right before the dr came in, but he
said it was okay and her normal reaction is to hold her breath and
there's also some reflex that makes her heart rate slow down for a
minute or so. It should improve as her digestion gets better.

Also she gained 4oz since her visit last week, which is right on
target. She is now definitely over 6lbs. That was reassuring to us.

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