Blood Pressure and Followup

So we went to Penelope's blood-pressure followup on, what, Monday? Anyway, they took her blood pressure via all four extremities, plus a heart ultrasound, and said she looks just fine. We'll go back for one more appointment in two months and there's no reason to suspect she'll be anything but healthy.

Not that you'd know it from the way she bellyached! I'll tell ya, I don't really hear it anymore, but judging from everyone else's reaction, she really can holler. I nursed as long as I could, but that only lasts an hour at the outside. Maybe this'll encourage the doctors to stay on schedule and move us out of there in a timely manner, hmmmm?

I also got a call from the nursery followup program. Any babies born before 32 weeks of gestation or under 1500 grams qualify for the followup; we get to go in every six months, more often if we think there's something we could use extra help with. I bent the nurse's ear for a while, just asking about various things I'd read in the preemie books.

Interesting tidbit #1: Because preemies miss their last couple months in the womb, they don't spend a lot of time curled inward, or flexed, so when they come out, the muscles that let them do that haven't developed. Preemies are often "high toned," meaning they can work in the big house. NO! That's not what it means. It means they arch backward a lot, which is something I've noticed with P -- that she peers backover one shoulder when she's in her little chair. I thought this meant she was interested in something back there, and I'll often turn her around to face whatever that is only to have her seem to decide something else, back where she used to face, is just as interesting. So that's one mystery solved. She's not paranoid, she just has weird muscle tone.

Interesting tidbit #2: Never mind. I forget. Anyway, we get to go in every six months to see how she's developing, which i love.

We've been doing tummy time, on the nurse's recommendation. She is pushing up and moving her head from one side to the other... slowly, wobbily, but surely. It's magic.