quick update

The bris was fabulous! thank you so much for coming to celebrate. We had many travelers:
From New York - Jason and Merrie Post, Laura Tanenbaum
From Philadelphia - Bruce and Ilene Silver, Ande and Jimmy Adelman
From California - Miriam Silver
From Chicago - Tiffany and Jerry
From Virginia/St. Louis - Krystin and Bill Drake
From Washington DC - Kirk and Kim Drake

We will post bris and baby shower pictures soon.

On Sunday night, Gigi came down with a fever. She has been home from school for 4 days in a row, but is going back to school tomorrow. She was tested for swine flu at the doctor's office and tested negative on the rapid office test. It isn't very reliable, so Jules is on tamiflu just in case it might make a difference for him. We have been told kindly that he doesn't have good odds for surviving swine flu and that would most likely end up on the ventilator. So, we are crossing our fingers that gigi doesn't bring him swine flu and that the vaccine arrives soon.

Heidi caught gigi's illness or picked up her own bug and has been gone wed, thursday, and will be gone friday. So, scott has had to be home from work since we were told by the doctors to keep Gigi and Jules completely separated on different floors of the house until she was well. They were reunited tonight after four days apart with much affection.

Goodnight,
Joy

Julian is One

From Jules' First Birthday

Jules made it to one. In 365 days his weight has increased 11x, he went from four tubes to one and from living in a clear plastic box to living in a fancy black cage. He crawls (in fact he stepped into the dishwasher today), he gurgles and gets happy and sad and mad. We couldn't have made it this far without all of your help.

Here's what I wrote 1 year ago (on 15 Oct)

Dear Friends and Family.

Jules arrived on Friday October 10th at 4:35pm, about two and half months early at 29 weeks and 3 days. He weighed about 1.5 pounds (1 lb 8.8 ounces) -- his head is about the size of a fist and his legs and arms are about the width of a chapstick. Our doctors made the decision to deliver him after weighing various factors, including a very small baby ("severe IUGR"), preeclampsia, and substantial decelerations in his heart rate. After making the decision, they delivered Julian by urgent cesarean section and then quickly transferred him to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) where he'll hang out until he's ready to come home.

Julian derives from youthful in Latin.

Jules is a fighter and is making slow, steady, "expected" progress for a micro-preemie. Over the next two months he'll start by taking his first steps to breathing on his own, eating breastmilk/formula and eventually over a long, bumpy path to coming home. The overwhelming, vast majority (95%+) of kids like Jules survive and about three quarters of them catch-up to "term" babies after a few years.

We are proud to be parents again but terrified and exhausted. And of course, Gigi is very excited to be a big sister. We're so happy to receive your messages, prayers, phone calls, emails but we're not quite sure how to feel about gifts right now.

You can continue to follow Jules' progress and see pictures at http://babysilver2.blogspot.com. Some of these pictures can be a little scary and may not be for everybody.

Happy New Year & Love,

Scott, Joy, big-sister-Gigi

P.S. The Brit Milah will be postponed until medically and spiritually appropriate.

Three more days

until Julian's birthday!

I have a lot of complicated feelings about his birthday that I'm trying to work through.

Joy

jules off LASIX!

Yay!

Jules went for his one year pulmonary clinic yesterday. It took a few hours, but he had his blood taken for labs and served up a PCo2 of 42! So we stopped the lasix cold turkey and are watching him for signs of respiratory distress. So far, so good. The docs were so pleased to see him end his year long dependence on a drug they were very worried about, so everyone was thrilled.

Jules weighed in at 17 pounds and 26 1/4 inches, which if you correct for three months early, puts him in the 0.0 percentile, but that is better than losing weight or falling off his growth curve. Since, he was born in the 0.0 percentile for height and weight, he is keeping up with his curve, so that is good.

He had a chest xray and occupational therapy and we picked up his special meds from the pharmacy. He is now on just two diuretics, his reflux med, and his potassium and sodium chloride.

He is working on waving hello and goodbye.

We have moved into and unpacked all the boxes on our kitchen level and bedroom level. Starting this weekend, we are going to unpack and excavate our "all the way downstairs' level, which will be a HUGE project. We are working to be completely moved in and unpacked for Julian's bris on 10/18.

Love,

Joy