The magic number is... 70!

He's worked so hard to get here! Today, Max reached full feeds, 70 mls every 3 hours! WOOHOO!!! He loves the stuff! We are so proud of him for being so patient (not really) and waiting to get to this point!

Now that he's up to full feeds, the doctors and dietitian are working to help him grow and strengthen his bones. Just this afternoon, they switched him to alternating bottles of formula and bottles of breast milk. The formula is a special brand (it ain't cheap!) and it has lots of calcium and phosphorus ( I hope that's the right mineral) to help strengthen his brittle bones. He's also taking a preemie multi vitamin twice a day. We hope to get those bones built up, but it will take several months after all that time on IV nutrition.

It's great to be at this point, and now we're BEYOND ready to get him home. We're trying to be patient, but after 115 days, our patience is almost dead. The main thing holding him back right now is this final surgery. I was afraid they were not going to be able to get to it this week, and we were ready to just take his discharge and come back in at a later time to do it outpatient. But we are on the surgery schedule for Friday, which could get him home early next week.

Ella starts kindergarten next Wednesday, so I'm pushing it to make everything happen. It's a rough week with no babysitter, Ella starting school, etc... so Mommy is feeling a little frazzled about how to make it all work. There are literally a few days, where we might not be able to get up to see him at all, if he's still in the hospital. I'm hoping that won't happen, because it makes me sad just to think about it.

He had his 4 month immunizations last night, yes, it really has been that long. He did really well with them. The rest of the family is going to the doctor this Wednesday to get our shots. Ella gets her 5 year old immunizations, Alex just needs a second Hep A shot for preschool, and Troy and I are both getting whooping cough shots.

Tonight, he passed his hearing screening, for both ears! It's funny, we've been so busy just trying to keep him alive, that you lose track of the other problems that could lie down the road. We are blessed that his sight and hearing both seem okay so far. Tomorrow or Wednesday, he'll have an MRI to check his brain development. That's scary as well, but we're hoping it will look good and give us some piece of mind.

After surgery, he'll be on the ventilator for 24-48 hours, then start eating, and within a few days, we hope he'll be able to come home. He'll need to have his car seat test still, after surgery. He needs to be able to sit in his car seat for 1-2 hours and maintain his oxygen and heart rate.

In the meantime, he's just eating and sleeping and pooping. We spend as much time with him as we can, but it will be so great to have everyone in one house together!