Cooper gained weight today! He is now 2130 grams, or 4 pounds 11 oz. :) His hand with the picc line is looking much less swollen today, which we're happy about! Also, today he had his two month shots. I can hardly believe he'll be two months on Monday.
For the last several days Cooper has been having what appears to be reflux. He has been receiving his milk feeds over two hours, and at the end of the two hours he drops his oxygen saturation levels because his stomach is full and he is likely refluxing. Earlier today they had to turn up his oxygen from a half liter to one liter. The purpose of doing his feeds over two hours instead of continuous feeds was to help his body recognize hunger cues. However, since the primary goal is to gain weight, for now we are more concerned about Cooper continuing to breathe with minimal support and to keep him comfortable. This afternoon the resident decided to do continuous feeds again, and it helped dramatically. They were able to turn his oxygen back down to half a liter. Overall, it was a good day for Cooper, and we're so happy he's gaining weight!
I want to share a sweet experience I witnessed today. The cancer and bone marrow unit is across the hall from the NICU, and while I was walking down the hall a sweet girl who was about 3 years old was skipping towards the cancer unit happily singing "No hair, don't care!" She was bald and wearing a Cinderella dress, and watching her almost stopped me in my tracks. I can hardly imagine how difficult it is to fight cancer at only three years old, but her sweet spirit and positivity radiated from her tiny body. It was a great reminder to me that even during the most difficult of circumstances, we can be grateful and find joy. It also reminded me of this talk!
"Perhaps focusing on what we are grateful for is the wrong approach. It is difficult to develop a spirit of gratitude if our thankfulness is only proportional to the number of blessings we can count. True, it is important to frequently “count our blessings”—and anyone who has tried this knows there are many—but I don’t believe the Lord expects us to be less thankful in times of trial than in times of abundance and ease. In fact, most of the scriptural references do not speak of gratitude forthings but rather suggest an overall spirit or attitude of gratitude. It is easy to be grateful for things when life seems to be going our way. But what then of those times when what we wish for seems to be far out of reach?
Could I suggest that we see gratitude as a disposition, a way of life that stands independent of our current situation? In other words, I’m suggesting that instead of being thankful for things, we focus on being thankful in our circumstances, whatever they may be." -Dieter F. Uchtdorf
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