When Carolyn called the NICU for her regular 3:30 AM check-in she was told that Max's nurse, nurse B., (or indeed any member of the NICU team) couldn't come to the phone because they were having a photo shoot; there seemed to be a lot of hilarity in the background. Despite (or perhaps because of) the attention, Max had sort of a hard night. He vomited up quite a large amount after a feed, and was generally fussy and needy all night.
However, his day nurse, M., decided that Max was up to the challenge of feeding himself. She pulled out his ng tube and tried feeding him entirely from a bottle. She and Carolyn traded off all day long, with M. particularly concerned that Max conserve his energy for bottle feeding and not play as much as normal. Max did really well, although getting 110 ccs into him every four hours was quite hard, and by the end of the day they'd reinserted his ng tube. We were thrilled. Max had most of a day without an ng tube and, if nothing else, Carolyn managed to get some great pictures.
The admissions team from HSC called the NICU to gather more information on Max. They asked how he looked --- "he looks pretty good; he does have a very big head" according to nurse M. They also asked what the parents were like. We're not quite sure how she responded to that one. Right now, there seems to be a 50/50 shot that Max will go to HSC tomorrow. Carolyn spent the evening assembling huge gift baskets for the NICU team.
