The waiting game is hard. The main question I had for today's meeting, which I knew wouldn't be answered definitively, is when can Quinn come home. The answer we got was, it all depends on Quinn. All he needs to do is prove he can breathe, suck, and swallow. It's simple, but it's not easy. The neonatologist said that Quinn has made tremendous strides in the last week or two, but he still has progress to make before we can get him home. And the only thing preventing the transfer is the ophthalmologist's next exam. It's possible then that next week he could get transferred and at least going to see him would be easier. There was a nurse practitioner there as well, who said that the other hospital has a level III NICU. I had thought they were a level II, but I guess not. That really surprised me given that the picture we had been painted of them was that they were basically worthless. Being a level III only makes them semi-worthless, I guess.

My other main purpose in this meeting was to scare up any other hidden things that might hold us up, like the ophthalmologist, whom no one predicted would be the deciding factor. We didn't come up with anything like that, but there were some things we weren't aware of. One is that Quinn will be followed by a developmental pediatrician, and have an appointment with him in 3 to 6 months, just to see if he's doing the things a 3 to 6 month old baby should be doing. Another is that there is yet another specialist who will work with us about getting Quinn totally off oxygen once he is home. We haven't met either of these people yet. Another fascinating detail that came out today is that the need for a VCUG test did not come from the urologist. It came from someone else among the neonatologists and NP's there. The urologist never intended to do it. And he doesn't need to see Quinn for another 2 to 3 months, unless the hernia gets worse, which isn't expected as of now, but that's something we'll need to keep a watch on. This is what happens when messages are passed through too many people. We've all played telephone. We know what happens by the third or fourth person. They had hoped the urologist would be at this meeting, but no such luck. We'll have to track him down sometime in the future, although I still plan to seek other opinions on the hypospadias repair. We also talked about whether or not Quinn needs to see an orthopedist. The consensus was that currently his foot turning out isn't severe enough to warrant that, and it's something our pediatrician is capable of watching to see if that will be necessary in the future. And finally, we confirmed that no, there isn't a weight limit for going home, Quinn just needs to prove that he will keep growing and progressing. So, we checked a lot of questions off our list, and the main answer was wait and see.

Because of the meeting, we didn't spend very much time with Quinn himself today. I had brought up in the meeting that that is a huge reason to get him transferred, so that we can actually spend more time with him, and I could go in more than once per day to nurse him. Everyone agreed, but it's all dependent on how the next eye exam goes. So pray for better vision, and better breathing, and better eating, and, well, better overall. That's probably far more efficienct than looking at individual parts. Quinn is more than just a sum of his parts. Tomorrow I'm going in for his early evening feed and try to nurse him again. I would like to have done that today and we got there just before the meeting and could have done that, but his nurse started his feed early, because she was going to the meeting with us. It was probably my fault, since I didn't let anyone know I wanted to try again, but I was disappointed. He was awake and very alert while we were there, and interacted with us, but that was precious little time. The idea that he'll come home and I'll have unlimited time with him is entirely foreign to me right now. I can't wait.