another day of quiet recovery, which is a good thing these days. slightly frustratingly, we still haven't heard the results from the echocardiogram which will tell us if his patent ductus artierosis has closed, but his blood gasses are so good that i think everyone is assuming that it's closed. also, they are apparently having trouble determining what the bug was that showed up in one of his blood samples and haven't been able to find any more of it, so it's likely that we'll never know for now if it was contamination or is simply lurking in the background at undetectable levels while he's on the antiobiotic regime. or maybe it's gone for good.

they started eric's breastmilk feedings again, which means that they are getting more confident that he's recovering from his recent "troubles".

technically, they aren't really feedings as they are giving him such a small amount - only 1 cc every 3 hours, but it's a start. rather than sending the food directly to his intestines via an "o.j." ( oral to jejunum ) tube, they've decided to see if he's can tolerate sending the milk directly to his stomach via his "o.g." ( oral to gut ) tube. this is another small sign that they believe he's getting stronger, despite his pneumonia.

the nicu is packed these days and when it gets packed it gets noisy. it's a small nicu with only 15 beds, but it's a small space and can get quite crowded when all the beds are filled, if all the babies have visitors. there's and ebb and flow to visitors and during peak hours it the constant din of conversation and bells ringing can make it sound like a surreal cocktail party.

if you're paying attention when it's noisy, you'll notice eric sending little signs that things are getting too loud, such as grasping his ear tightly in an attempt to block out the sound. subtle signal, no?

kris finished reading eric jonathan livingston seagull. he liked it a lot.

"poor fletch. don't believe what your eyes are telling you. all they show is limitation. look with your understanding, find out what you already know, and you'll see the way to fly."