4 May

For the past few days Max has been vomiting (actually it's more a regurgitation or occasionally a 'spill') after every feed. It's getting a bit frustrating, and a little scary as we are always considering his lungs. So last night Marissa (nurse) & I decided to put his Gaviscon into his stomach first, rather than last (after the feed), as all the other nurses have told me to do. And, hey presto, no vomit and he burped a lot more easily (he swallows a lot of air and needs to stop several times during a feed). It was the same today - and then I was told by the doctors that he should have been having the Gaviscon IN the entire feed (as it says on the packet, but I was told earlier to ignore that!!). So at the midday feed I put it in the whole feed, and up to the time I left for lunch - no vomit. Yay Max.

He's taking between half and two-thirds of a 'full' bottle each time it's offered. He had taken a full bottle (two days ago), and I got 75ml (out of 95ml) into him today, so the big question is consistency now.

We had our milk room training today - basically a run through of how to make up formula and sterilise everything. I suppose they must get some strange people through public hospitals and need to go over everything. Pat was great, though, and we discussed the different types of formula (no brand names!) that Max may be sent home on. He'll be tried on another formula from next week to see how he deals with that one - apparently the one he's on now is a very restricted type, and if we want to have it we (and our doctor) have to jump thourgh a few hoops in terms of government paperwork to justify Max's needing it. So, we'll try the other type and hopefully he'll make it easy on all of us.

Next week we work on getting Mark & I ready to take Max home. We have a CPR seminar, and we have to bring in Max's car seat & pram and sit him in it with his O2 monitoring attached to make sure he can breathe properly and isn't restricted in any way. (Hope he's OK, we've paid enough for this equipment!) We'll then be able to take Max for a walk around the hospital, or even take him home for a visit between feeds! We are extremely nervous, but as each day goes by, we're more confident.

We have, however, been told we are highly likely to have issues with him falling ill, especially as he's going home over winter. We've had flu vaccinations, and Max will have one as well, but any virus could hit him quite badly, and we may end up back in hospital, even Level 3. Very scary.

New photos - Max in the 'rocker' that the unit has for older babies (despite his expression he actually like being in it), and Max wearing the NYPD suit his Chocha Hush brought back from New York for him.