6 months old

Possum is now 6 months old!

He weighs 5kg.

He has found his hands and likes to suck his fingers and thumbs.

He was rolling from tummy to back 3 weeks ago but hasn't since heart surgery.

He has had surgery to repair bilateral ingroinal hernias.

He has had surgery to ligate a PDA.

He is still wearing 0000 clothes.

He has moved from newborn nappies into infant size, just in the last week.

He smiles a lot.

He has started cooing.

He has been hospitalised once since the initial discharge.

He remains on iron for anaemia.

He is on monitoring for apnoeas.

He breastfeeds well, but still every 2-3 hours around the clock.

Mostly he settles himself to sleep.

He loves being in the Hug-a-Bub.

Back to School

School is back in full swing at our place :)

Bugsy is working on -

Horizon K math book 1

Explode the Code 1

All About Spelling 1

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, 30 lessons to go

Nora Gaydos Readers

Bugsy seems very keen at the moment and his reading is coming along smashingly! I've seen a huge difference in the last couple of months.

Flossy is working on -

Writing With Ease 2

All About Spelling 3

Miquon Blue

Kumon Word Problems 2

Getting Started with Latin

Grammar Island

Story of the World 2

Real Science Odyssey 'Life'

Currently reading The Chronicles of Narnia

Flossy isn't too inspired to work at the moment. I think she really enjoyed her time off last year and is finding the workload a little tough. It hasn't helped that we have been inconsistent over the last month with Possum's hospital stay. Hopefully things will settle down over the coming weeks.

Possum has emergency heart surgery!

Just 2 weeks ago we went to a routine cardiac appointment only to be told that Possum had systemic pulmonary hypertension! He was immediately put on medication to reduce the pressures in his lungs and we were told that he would need surgery later in the year to fix his PDA.

Over the ensuing days Possum became breathless and wasn't feeding well. I took him to the emergency department and after consultation with numerous doctors it was found that the medication had worked too well and Possum had heart failure and pulmonary oedema.

We were transferred to the major children's hospital and after more discussion it was decided that Possum would have surgery to fix his PDA as soon as possible. The surgery was organised for the following day.

The operation went smoothly. Possum was cut under the arm about level with the shoulder blade. His lung was deflated and pushed aside and the PDA was ligated. He was ventilated for about 24 hours following the surgery and spent that time in PICU. During his time in PICU they weaned him off the sedation and morphine. The extubation was a little rocky for the first hour or so but after a couple of rounds of meds he was breathing on his own again, phew! He remained on supplementary oxygen for a further 24 hours. He resumed breastfeeding like a champ!

Possum in PICU

During our stay in the hospital it became evident that Possum has apnoeas when he is asleep. As a result we are now on apnoea monitoring when he is asleep and in his car seat. We have also now been told that he has a further heart condition, an ASD and we hope to find more out about that at our follow up cardio appointment in a couple of weeks time.