We're up to 2.5 pounds! Quinn weighs 1130 g, which translates to 2 lbs 8 oz. So he's gained nearly a pound in three and half weeks of life. So he's gained more than half his birth weight. Try that on for size. I got to kangaroo him for an hour today. At one point he was obviously uncomfortable, and his oxygen monitor showed that. He picked up his head and turned it the other way. Now, you think a normal newborn's head is enormous. The ratio of head to body in a preemie is even bigger. So something must be going right if he can pick his head up on that tiny little neck. And I watched him get fed, which is nothing more exciting than about half a teaspoon of milk being pushed veeeerrry sloooowly through his feeding tube.

I was also there when the attending doctor made rounds, with residents in tow. The main concern was his electrolyte level, because he seems to be excreting an awful lot. All a part of being premature. It wasn't overly concering, he just needs s little extra for now, and supposedly within 2 to 3 weeks he'll be able to regulate all these levels by himself.

I'm trying to keep a perspective of his long stay in the NICU so that I don't completely lose my mind. Most of the time I accomplish this by simply not thinking too hard. But every once in a while I get sort of an epiphany that helps a great deal. I had one yesterday. Kurt told me he tries not to get to discouraged that Quinn is the smallest baby in that particular nursery. It occurred to me that yes, he is small, but that is his number one problem, and all the other peripheral things are because of that. But it's something he will literally outgrow. Two of the other babies in there have bigger problems. One has a heart defect and one has cleft palate. Those aren't simply outgrown. Growing is a passive process. Surgery is a lot more involved.