Its been pretty busy around the house these days. We have been working on gardens, had a new roof put on the house and just the business of summer like weather. Benjamin is pretty good. Yesterday he had a fever. The first fever he has ever had. I'm not really sure what is going on. Today he was a little warm, but nothing major. He ate well, but was a little sucky. He does have a buldge in his gums, so I'm thinking it might be related to teeth. He is wheezing and coughing again too, but we seem to follow a trend with his asthma. We go a couple weeks with nothing and then have a week or two of wheezing. I'm not sure how he will do with the super warm humid weather. We go see the asthma doctor again soon, so we'll she what she has to say.

Benjamin has really started to crawl this weekend. He's starting to make his way away around the house. He also pulled himself up on the coffee table and piano bench..so I'm gonna move those things downstairs for a while to minimize the injury risk. Its exciting to see him moving. He's right on track for his corrected age of 8.5mths. I'm so proud.

Anyways..Benjamin has a new cousin as of Friday so I'm excited to see what he thinks of a tiny baby. I'm sure he won't pay much attention, but I can't wait to get some pictures of him and my niece Tatum. I'll post them when I can.

Things have been progressing around here. Benjamin is doing great. He is back to his usual self and starting to get into more trouble. On Saturday he crawled. He hasn't been doing it a lot, but I think within the next couple of weeks he'll have it down pat. He is also trying to pull himself up on the furniture. I'm thinking I'm going to have to put away my glass coffee table for a little while. He has also been very vocal lately. He definitely lets us know he's around. He loves to sit and play..but he has to have mommy or daddy close by. I still have been nursing him a little, but mostly pumping and bottle feeding, but since he's been in the hospital he's been a lot more interested in nursing again. I'm assuming its for comfort. I don't mind at all...he's really starting to try to initiate which is funny...even when he's not hungry. Ideally I would like to get him nursing again when he's eating more solids and doesn't depend on my milk as much.

Anyways Benjamin's incision is fully healed. The steri-strips came off today. Its amazing how quickly its all healed up. It will be nice to get him into the tub after 2 weeks. Sponge bathing just doesn't cut it for messy baby like him. I'll take a new picture of his tummy once he's all cleaned up.

Well this week has been good. Benjamin is recovering so well. He's been so happy and active..Its been so nice to watch him laugh and smile. He's back to his busy self which is such a relief. His sleeping habits still aren't great, but I knew it would take a bit to get back into the swing of things. We have no appointments this week...no doctors appointments until the 14th of June when we see the surgeon again. We still have occupational therapy, but that's once a month. We're just enjoying things quietly at home...feeling so incredibly blessed.

Benjamin had a great first day back home. He slept well last night and was in a great mood all day. He's been eating well and we're starting him back on solids tomorrow. I think he is having a little morphine withdrawal though..they didn't shut it off until mid day yesterday and today he was very busy, hardly sleeping and restless. Hopefully tomorrow he'll be back to himself. Now we don't have to see the surgeon until June 14th, unless he has issues with his incision. Its amazing how resilient kids are..I have known this about Benjamin for a long time, but he had major surgery Thursday..more major then we anticipated..and today he didn't even need tylenol. He was rolling around, bending over, reaching for toys and it didn't bother him what-so-ever. Surgery like that lay up an adult for at least 6 weeks and require some heavy duty pain meds. He's my hero :) Anyways we are so happy to be home and thrilled that things are going so well.

Tummy Before

Tummy today

Well over the last 2 days things have moved remarkably fast. Yesterday Benjamin had a repeat x-ray and things looked so much better. He had a poop on his own yesterday afternoon so that was very reassuring. He pulled out his NG tube on his own, in classic Benjamin style. We were thankful that the doctor just said to leave it out. This morning we started feeding him again. He ate well and continued to eat well through the day today. So..the doctor gave us the ok to head home. I am so thankful that things turned around so quickly. We had a few scarey moments, but everything seems to be headed in the right direction. We thought about staying one more night, but the thought of snuggling Benjamin at home in my bed was just to good. We're prayer that he just continues to heal..that his incision doesn't get infected and that we can finally close this chapter in our lives.

Before surgery.

After surgery...right away he was fighting to extubate so they tied his hands down.

Snuggling with mom in the PCCU

Trying to get some sleep in the really bright room

Finally feeling well enough to play

Watching some t.v.

So last night wasn't great. Benjamin started throwing up a lot. The doctors did some bloodwork and x-rays to try to rule out and obstructions in his bowel. His bloodwork was great so that is a good thing. The x-rays showed lots of gas and poop in his bowels but nothing that would indicate and obstruction. Our surgeon is away but the surgeon but the surgeon on call is great. He said that its common for the bowels to go into shock and stop working for a bit. So they stopped feeding him and put on an ng tube to drain his stomach contents. There wasn't much bile which is great, but there is a lot of old blood indicating his stomach is irritated so they put him on meds for that. They are giving him suppositories as well to try to get things moving. So we're hoping things will start working soon. Please keep praying that things work themselves out and Benjamin will heal quickly.

So sorry I couldn't post sooner... blogger was down. Anyways..Benjamin did great through surgery.. he's such a strong boy. The ENT doctor said his airway was pristine and he would never know he was ever intubated. Thank God for that. When the surgeon went in she actually found 4 hernias. She repaired them all. His incision is bigger, but we're ok with scars. He did have some airway issues while he was intubated, so he had to go to the intensive care unit. The extubated around 2:30pm yesterday & Benjamin was completely off oxygen by midnight. We came up to the 6th floor and Benjamin is resting. I got him to finally smile this afternoon. He's pretty uncomfortable but is getting morphine & tylenol. If all goes well we'll be home Monday. Praise God. Thank you all for your prayers & support.