Is There Such a Thing as Normal?

Day of Life: 36

Today is Canon's first day at his new school, Our Lady of Sorrows (OLS) Catholic School. You may remember that I visited this place a couple of weeks ago with my friend, Anna, and have been very excited about Canon being there. When we got ready this morning, I tried to do things in the normal routine I remember from home, but it never works that way when you're in a new place.

We made it to OLS around 9:00 this morning. When we first arrived, Canon was a little hesitant to walk through the front doors, but when he saw the four-seater buggies that the children ride in, he was sold! It took some convincing, but I eventually got him away from the buggies and into his classroom. His teachers, Pat Pat and Ms. Margaret, were excited to see him and introduced him to all of his new classmates who were playing with toys on the floor. Canon very quietly made his way over to the toys to check them out. He wouldn't speak to or acknowledge anything but the Elmo toy on the shelf and the climbing mats on the floor. I was relieved to see another boy in the classroom violently shaking a tupperware container full of plastic toys. Finally, Canon wouldn't be the most aggressive child in the class.

He did manage to take time away from his new discoveries to give me a hug and say "La Loo," but he just stared at me when I waved to him from the doorway. I think he was wondering if I was going to come back and get him or leave him there for a week. He didn't seem bothered by either choice. I will admit that, though he didn't seem to mind my absence, I shed a few tears at leaving him in a new place. I just can't help it. I get nervous just leaving him in a new church nursery for an hour. An all-day habitat is bound to draw some moisture.

My next stop was the hospital. I have somewhat of a ritual of coming in the room, setting my bags down, saying a quick "hey" to the baby, then scrubbing in so that I can reach in and touch her as soon as possible. Usually when I do this, I stroke her hair and pat her bottom, maybe even try to tuck her feet underneath. I might try to get her to hold my finger by laying her hand over mine to tempt her to grab hold. She typically tolerates me doing all of this, but - besides the improvement of oxygen saturation and heart rate on her monitors - she shows no real signs of recognition or appreciation. Today, however, when I reached across her to adjust something that was in her face, she grabbed my finger. I mean really took hold and squeezed.

She has squeezed my finger before, but this time felt more purposeful. Before, it seemed mostly out of reflex or just coincidence. Today, I felt recognized.

Though we are not quite ready for bottle feeds, we are trying to get her ready for them. Tera took easily to a pacifier when she first arrived here, but we haven't done much with it since that first week or two. Today, in an effort to encourage the suck reflex and to keep her mouth closed so that too much oxygen wouldn't escape, Tera slept with her pacifier once more. I love how it's almost half the size of her face.

She is continuing her slow weight gain, now to 1459 grams, 3 pounds 3 ounces. She is still taking 25cc feeds and tolerating those well. I don't know if I mentioned "residuals" in my past posts, but those are what is left over in the baby's stomach after she has eaten. They basically just pull it out through her feeding tube using a syringe to see how well she is digesting her milk. Though after most feedings Tera has little to no residuals, she occasionally has 1 or 2 cc and, if it is still intact, the nurse will just feed it right back to her. Yuck!

This isn't her best angle, but I like to take advantage of Back Shots.

And, of course, my favorite time of day - Holding Time.

For some reason during this hold, I couldn't get my shirt wrapped under her head, so she stayed in a little coccoon. We read a chapter from our book today for the first time in a few days. This chapter was about praying for your child's relationship with siblings. A very fitting chapter considering Tera's sibling has recently moved in. The chapter went as you would expect it to go. There were examples of sibling rivalries and fights that were made right through prayer and faith in God. What I took from this chapter is that, despite our best efforts, siblings are going to fight and compete and seem to despise one another. What we as parents must do is watch out for those short and infrequent moments when our children do show love toward one another. That is when we know our prayers are working.

When I think back on my childhood, I don't remember that much about my siblings as far as specific memories. My clearest memories are with my little brother, Robert. He is three and a half years younger than me and, because I was not as cool as my older brother and sister, we usually ended up stuck together. We had the same friends in our neighborhood and somehow always ended up in the same places. I can remember hating every minute of it. Why did he have to be with me all the time? Couldn't he find his own friends? But I also remember how gut-wrenching it felt if anyone ever expressed those same feelings about him to me. If one of my friends ever said something about wishing Robert was not there (he was a good bit younger than the rest of us), I got the urge to just slap them across the face or say something equally as rude about their siblings. I didn't, of course (at least, I think I didn't), but my insides wanted to. The point is that those are probably the moments my parents prayed for. That even when fighting and bickering and competition seemed to take over our lives, we were still secretly happy to have each other.

Our prayer tonight: "Cause Canon and Tera to be devoted to one another in brotherly love, honoring one another above themselves." Romans 12:10 and "Make our home a good and pleasant place, where brothers (and sisters!) live together in unity." Psalm 133:1.

I got a late start picking up Canon and was, again, stuck in traffic for quite some time. When I finally got to him, he ran to me excitedly (something he rarely does at his school in Dothan). His teachers explained that he had a very good day and blended in so well with the other students. I was embarrassed to find out that he was quick to correct other children when they did something wrong. "No, No" apparently came out of his mouth quite a few times. But they did not seem bothered by it.

Before heading home we stopped at Jamie and Bob's house to see some friends and to let Canon play with Eleanor for awhile. They had a great time. Canon seemed not to have gotten his aggression out at school because he frequently (but somewhat gently) tackled Eleanor to the floor. She seemed to love it, though, so I tried to let it go. At one point, I asked Canon to tell Eleanor that he was sorry for running into her. He ran at her with arms open saying "So-wy, So-wy." Eleanor immediately took on a defensive pose, tucking her arms into her chest and leaning over to protect herself from his force. Canon stopped and said, "No, No! Hug! Hug!" He grabbed her arms and pulled them apart, then gave her the biggest sweetest hug I've ever seen. I wish I had my video camera handy.

Back at home it was business as usual. Supper Time. Bath Time.

Then some quiet time with Nonna before climbing into bed . . .

. . . to start again tomorrow.

What About Barry

I think Barry will be working late a lot this week, now that he doesn't have a wife or child to tend to in the evenings. He's probably also getting in a lot of Sports Center and basketball. We got some FaceTime with him tonight, and we learned that all is well at home. He was at Josh and Mary's house, so we got to see them, too. Canon was able to say "hey" to Colt, who had a very interesting hair-do for the night. He had at least three rubberbands holding his hair up in all different directions. Canon and I both got a laugh out of that. Oh the fun those two neighbors are going to have when we get back home!