Happy One Month Birthday!!

We celebrated Charlie's one month birthday by taking him on his first visit to Sunday School and to a brunch at our good friends Tim and Mitzi's house (Chris Traxson's brother). He enjoyed seeing lots of people and hearing interesting new voices. Then this afternoon he got to spend quality time with daddy while I went Christmas shopping. He rewarded us with lots of "output" tonight, just to let us know he is functioning. Which we do not take for granted! More on that in a minute.

We remember how we celebrated Jackson's one month birthday. We got a balloon with the number one on it and tied it to his bed in the hospital. Here is a piece of our email update from November 12, 2004...

They finally weighed him yesterday for the first time since birth. He came
in at 6lbs 4 oz.!! Some of that is probably still fluid weight because his
swelling still is not totally gone, so he probably really weighs more like 5
3/4 lbs or so. But that is still up nearly 2 whole pounds from his birth
weight of 3lbs 13oz. Pretty good considering how early he was and how sick. We are still almost 4 weeks shy of his due date.

Speaking of dates, he is one month old today!

Please continue your prayers for Jack. Even though he is doing so much
better now, he is still a sick little baby and needs lots of prayers.

It really takes us back to read old posts and remember how it was with Jackson. We are reminded yet again of what a completely different world it is when you have a sick baby in the NICU. That is why we have a Foundation. It is just so hard to explain to those who have never lived through it, and even now it is hard for us to remember exactly what it's like to worry every millisecond of the day, to focus on weighing diapers and vent settings and lab results, to analyze every single rise and fall of the chest. To wait months to hold your baby. To exist solely within the confines of the hospital for weeks on end just waiting each day for some signal from the doctor to let you know whether it's an up day or a down day. All of that seems very remote to us now as we cuddle Charlie and buy him clothes and complain about having to feed him at 3 AM after he has slept on our chests for 4 hours. But we cannot forget, and we cannot stop telling our experience to others in hopes of making a difference for all of those babies and families who are also going through it. Because we also learned that it never ever stops, not on Christmas or New Year's or weekends or any other time--those babies keep coming day in and day out and there is another family beginning the nightmare at any given moment. So that is why we do what we do, and it is worth it!! And someday we will tell Charlie all about Jackson and what a strong, brave boy he was, and maybe he will understand and be proud of his big brother too!

It is now time to sign off for the night. James has pretty much watched Charlie for me all afternoon and all night, so it's my turn. Here's to a fantastic month!!!