Tasting Food For the First Time

What do you take for granted?

That food has a taste? That you get it with your mouth? That you can control how much and how fast you take it in?

Yesterday Hale ate his first food. With his actual mouth. Mother's milk, in a bottle. Sweet/sour Mimi, the crazy* night nurse gave him two full feedings with a bottle. "Nippling him," is how they say it.

(*crazy=awesome, in a crazy way. you should meet her. you'd like her.)

The deal is, the wiring inside his head (or any kid's, at 34 weeks' gestation) generally isn't squared away for the holy triumvirate: Suck+Swallow+Breathe. He can reliably do any two, and at this point requires some special attention to ensure he doesn't get himself into any trouble gulping that stuff down.

I got to feed him about a half-feeding (20ml, or about 2/3 oz--he's getting about 40ml per feeding, eight times a day) with a bottle yesterday. It made me nervous, the nurse saying, things like, 'watch you don't drown him, now!"


Takes concentration not to drown your son. Pacing.

He's gaining weight pretty fast (4lbs 13oz today), and now with this starting to eat thing, we're about equal parts excited and scared they're going to send the pup home with us sooner rather than later.

Nobody's given us a timeline, or any kind of targets exactly (like a weight, say, 6lbs, that seems to be in lots of people's heads) for when he'll be able to go home.

Pretty much, when Hale is able to regulate his own temperature reliably (check, basically), gain weight from food he's taking by mouth (well under way), and more or less stop with the little 'forgetting to breathe' and 'not bothering to have a heartbeat' episodes (which he's improving at at a rate which seems slow but which doesn't seem to alarm anyone who ought to know better)--then he'll get out of there.

Oh, and I literally just this minute found this out: He also has to nipple from a breast or a bottle for all eight feedings in order to come home. I think I foresee a singularly tired Amy in our near future!