Z’s – Baby Life

Day 11 – Doctor’s visit

Logan had an appointment at the pediatrician today. His weight increased by 7 oz. in 5 days. Awesome news. Half of this was expected by the pediatrician. We had to bring Logan down to the lab in the same building for the newborn screening. We also opted for the advance newborn screening test. This cost extra and is not covered by the health insurance but gives us a little more information about his health condition, allergies, etc.. This was an exhausting experience for the little one. They got the blood from his left foot and it took a while to pressure him enough so that all the tests could be done. We felt so sorry for the little guy. Logan fell asleep on the way back home and did not make any noise until his next feeding time.

Sometimes we just stand next to Logan’s crib and watch him sleep. He looks so peaceful. He is actually a funny guy. He makes faces like crazy. When he smiles he looks so cute. Of course we know that he cannot control his facial expressions yet and that might be the reason for his huge variety of faces that he makes.

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Day 16 – Scary moments

Logan kept us awake over night and we got only 2-3 hours of sleep total. We tried all the known (to us) tricks to get him to sleep but with only limited success. This morning his 9.00 AM feeding worked out well and he drank 1.5 oz.of breast milk from the bottle. Simone had to leave for a doctors appointment and I took care of the baby. He was behaving very cranky or grumpy and was routing again. So, I gave him a little more (0.5 oz.) and he was fine. 15 minutes later Logan suddenly started making strange noises and moments later he threw up and spilled everything over himself. I jumped up and grabbed him from where I had put him to sleep. I made sure that he had no breathing problems and that his mouth and throat were clear.

Scary moments for me. As this is our first baby everything is basically new to us and we have a huge learning curve to go through. We have learned a lot from this book Baby 411 and can highly recommend it to new parents.

Time to go upstairs and clean up this little baby. Simone arrived back home from her doctors appointment and helped me. In a few minutes we had the little guy undressed, re-diapered and back in a Onesies.

Overall – we are still having problems breast feeding this baby. He seems to become frustrated that it is more work than just drinking from the bottle. Pumping is becoming frustrating for Simone as it takes away a lot of time from her day. Especially at night the pumping is cumbersome.

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Day 9 – Not so nice surprise

A letter from our health insurance arrived. They informed us that they would not cover Logan’s stay in the intensive care nursery. According to their information a stay in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) would not have been needed at all. We were shocked and a little scared. This could mean a huge bill for us that we would have to pay for ourselves. I called the pediatrician and asked her about her opinion. She agreed that this decision by the health insurance did not look right. She offered to write a statement about Logan’s health condition when he was born so that we could go and appeal the decision. I also called the hospital to get the name of the doctor who made the initial decision to keep Logan in the NICU. He was hard to get a hold off but in the end he offered to call the hospital and to work with them on this case.

We never had problems with health insurance and claims. We have paid a lot of money into the pool over the years and almost never ‘used’ the money we paid. It’s a little frustrating to become part of this game between doctors, hospitals and the health insurance industry.

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Day 18 – Health Insurance

The hospital manager called us. She had worked with the Neonatal specialist and the health insurance to take care of the insurance denying approval for the claim. Apparently the whole issue went high up within the health insurance organization before it got worked out. According to the manager the insurance would contact us to confirm that they are approving the charges for the baby intensive care nursery.

We felt relieve. The fear of an extremely high health insurance bill had stressed us a little bit and this now was really good news. Still – we will feel more comfortable when all this stuff has been taken care of. We also received a letter from the anesthesiologist with an informational invoice. At this time they were only verifying the insurance information to file the actual claim. Did you know that an epidural during labor and C-section cost a total of $2,300.00 USD ? That is probably for about 1.5 – 2 hours of work. I am working in the wrong business …..

Our nights are still short and I am still amazed how long I can stay awake. I even noticed that the instant coffee that I bought shows the following on the lable: "Eye-opening Aroma". I can confirm – this coffee made strong enough keeps me going. Currently I am working about 3-4 hours a day remotely for my employer. I am also working 4-5 hours for my own business. The rest of the time is filled with baby related stuff and sleep. I always feel tired and every 3rd day I need a nap to survive.

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Day 5 – Coming home

Simone and Logan were allowed to go home today. For whatever reason the hospital just did not get a doctor up there to discharge Simone and so we had to wait useless until almost 3.00 PM before we could leave. That was very frustrating. The morning had started really good. Our pediatrician had looked at Logan and considered him ready to go home. She signed the discharge paperwork and told us that her receptionist would call us to make an appointment for in 2 days. Indeed the receptionist called us an hour later and at least that part was taken care off.

We finally had a doctor discharge Simone and we were on our way home. Logan’s first ride in a car went well. He was sleeping the whole way. At home we had nothing really prepared due to Logan arriving 4 weeks early (see our Blog for details – http://firsttimepregnancy.com/blog ). We took care of the crib and finally were able to sit down and take a breather. This was it. We are having a baby. And now what?

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Catching up …

Catching up

I realize that I have not written down much about life with the baby in a while. My apologies. I can tell you – time is becoming very limited with a baby around. In the next few weeks I will fill you in on (almost) everything that happened since my last posting in June. Please make sure you go back and check out the updates as they happen.

I think my wife and I totally under-estimated the impact of how it is to have a baby. We had talked to many parents before having the baby and we also read many books about pregnancy and having a baby. We thought we knew what to expect but I would say we were far off with our "guesstimates". It sometimes makes the impression that nobody really likes to talk about the ‘dark’ side of things when having a baby. Is our society putting so much pressure on new parents that everything has to appear as perfect at all times? Over the last few months some of our friends who had babies a while before we had Logan suddenly admitted that (example) their baby did not want to sleep during the day, too. Or that it took them 7 months before their baby slept through the night.

Before we had heard these things we thought we would do something wrong. Was it possible that our baby was the only not sleeping through the night after 3 months? Did our baby was the only that did not want to sleep during the day at all? From this writing you can tell – some things just did not turn out as expected and with this said there were quite some hard times around in our house. And as we found out – not everything is perfect in other families, too. Don’t worry if your baby does not sleep through the night after 3 months. That is perfectly normal. Yes, it is stressful but there is nothing wrong with it – no matter how many magazines or books or other parents try to convince you otherwise.

Well, we survived so far and enjoy having our little baby boy "Logan". The good moments make up for the stressful moments before. Come back soon to read more about our experiences. Again, sorry for the delay in updates. We will make up for this.

Christoph & Simone Puetz

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Feeding problems

Lately Logan decided to make it more difficult for us to feed him. First of all we’re kind of stuck at around 80 ml – 100 ml of breast milk per feeding. And then he decided to refuse the bottle / nipple by moving his head from the left to the right and vice versa whenever we try to feed him. Sometimes we get lucky and the nipple into his mouth and he starts drinking. On other occasions we have to give up because he just does not take it.

We can tell that he is hungry but we do not know what is causing this behavior. At the end of the day we still end up that he has taken enough breast milk to be within the appropriate range given to us by the pediatrician. As an example – at a certain point the minimum he needed during the day was 16 oz. and we were able to feed 18 oz. That is still not a lot to gain more weight.

Filed Under: Z's - Baby Life - Diary

Day 11 – Doctor’s visit

Day 16 – Scary moments

Day 9 – Not so nice surprise

Day 18 – Health Insurance

Day 5 – Coming home

Catching up …

Feeding problems

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