Nico's Cleft Journey

NicoleLJ

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#21
I think I will call and ask in the New Year.

We just got back from Nico's first immunization appointment. He is sound asleep right now. Anyway last time he was weighed and measured was on December 3rd. At that time he was 21.75 inchs and 11 lbs even. Today (December 27th) he is 23 inchs and 12.3 lbs. So he gained over 1 lbs in 24 days. He is doing wonderfully. He is healthy and strong. His next set of immunizations is scheduled for February 21. So almost 2 weeks prior to his surgery. Which should be plenty of time to get better prior to surgery.
 

NicoleLJ

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Today is a busy day as we get ready to head to the Childrens hospital this week for Nico's check up. They will take more pictures to see how his cleft lip has changed as he has grown to be able to better assess things for his Surgery in March. Another 3 day trip. Since the Childrens Hospital is 3 hours away it is just too much to do it all in one day. Luckily we have some good friends in the city we always stay with. So we go up the day before the appointment, then the next day is the appointment which this time they said should only be about an hour. And then the next day we come home. Makes things a lot easier. Anyway can't give an update without providing pictures of our totally handsome little man.

These pictures are from this morning while I was pumping. He is playing in his exersaucer and having a ton of fun.




















Hope you enjoyed
 

Giny

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#24
Best wishes to you all during Nico's journey. You sound very well prepared which is a huge in helping him go through this easiest possible. He's a beautiful baby!
 

NicoleLJ

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#25
Ugg had to post pone Nico's check up till the 20th of February. No worries though. It is just to take pictures and measurements to prepare for the surgery in March. So as long as we got in before March all is well.
 

NicoleLJ

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#26
Nico is 3 months old and we are leaving in 2 days for the Childrens Hospital for Nico's post op apointment. They will take measurements, photos and answer any questions we have about the operation in March. Nico has grown a ton since they last saw him in November. He is a very happy little dude, who loves to laugh and talk. I will update here when we get back, on what we learned and we will bring a camera as well. I am so glad we got some proffesional shots done of him. Canadian Baby photograpers where doing a free photo shoot in our home and got some beautiful pictures of Nico. When we get our package in April I will post them up too. I have talked to other moms who have been through this part of the cleft journey and they said to make sure to take tons of pictures because a part of us will miss his wide smile once it is gone. I can believe that. Anyway on to the best part. Nico pictures and a video at the bottom.











Our sleep little guy after a good feed.


Video of our little chatter box


Hope he brought as big a smile to your day as he does to ours
 

NicoleLJ

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We are home. And it was a good trip. The trip up was easy. We timed it for one of Nico's nap times. So he slept almost the whole way. 45 minutes from our friends house he woke up and played and cooed till we were about 5 minutes from our friends house. Then he let us know he was done. But as soon as we got there he was awsome. He stayed up till 11pm though but then crashed for 6 whole hours. So we almost got a whole nights worth of sleep. We got to our appointment on time, early actually. His weight came in at 13.9 lbs. So he has gained well over a pound. He has also gained 4 inchs around his head and also a couple of inchs in length. So right on track. The only person out of the 5 people he saw that he didn't like was one of the ear techs who did his hearing test. He did not like them sticking things in his ears. Plus the tech said he had fluid in his ears so would need tubes. We questioned this since his hearing seems perfectly normal to us. So the ear, nose and throat specialist, who was already scheduled to see him that day, retested him himself and said that the test was wrong. No fluid so no tubes needed. We saw the plastic surgeon and everything is set for the surgery. Now just to keep Nico from getting sick. That is the only thing that could stop the surgery now.


Now the trip back home was a whole other can of worms. Nico had been awsome the entire morning we were at the hospital(4 hours). But missed two naps. So was WAY over tired and over stimulated. Ended up screaming the entire way home. Poor little guy. We stopped regularly to feed him and to check to make sure he was clean. Only twice did he want to feed and only needed to be changed once. So it was solely being over tired. Finally feel asleep 45 minutes from home. Our heads are killing us but we arrived safe. Nico is awake and happy to be home. Poor guy is ready to get back to his schedule. But all in all it was a worth while trip. So now counting down to the surgery on March 5th.
 

NicoleLJ

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#34
The count down begins. 7 days till we head to the city with the Childrens Hospital and 9 days till Nico's surgery. My stress and worry level is slowly rising. How do moms or dads handle this? Nico is so little. He is not suppose to feel pain, fear or any of the stuff that can come from something like this. He is just suppose to laugh, eat, be loved, warm and so on. The Childrens Hospital called yesterday to give me more information. One plus is that he can feed up to 4 hours prior to the surgery. So that will help. I am trying to keep my mind on what needs to be done, packed and so on and not think of the emotional side of things but that is getting hard.
 

NicoleLJ

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#35
Well tomorrow we leave for Nico's surgery. It is scheduled for Tuesday morning but we are heading to the city tomorrow afternoon so that we don't feel rushed. Hard to believe that the pictures we take the next 2 days will be the last pictures of Nico with his beautiful smile. I am sad to see it go. But I know he will look so wonderful in the end of all this.

Here is Nico just after he woke up from his nap. Not quite ready to smile yet.


Grabbing his feet. He loves his feet right now


He is able to sit in his stroller now as long as he has the back support.


Smiles




Yes everything has to checked out with his mouth now. lol








Nico says bye for now and see you next week with his new smile
 

iluvdogs

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#38
Nico is sooo cute!! Love the smiles!!

Good luck tomorrow to both you and nico!!
 

NicoleLJ

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Typing on the nextbook is long and frustrating so this update wil be short till I can get to a real keyboard. First we thank you for all the support. Nico's surgery went really well. He was feeding within a couple of hours of it and from then on had no problems feeding. The first day he did have a really hard time till they could get his pain management under control. They could not give him morphine to help because he had a bad reaction to it in the OR. But once we got it under control he started to improve quickly and is now back to his normal happy self. The surgery site looks so good that to look at it you can't tell he had a cleft. Just looks like he cut his lip and his nose looks so cute now. I will post lots of pictures when we finally get home
 

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