Little Blue Eyes

Today Cohen and I ventured out of the house to go to his follow-up eye appointment. The doctor was checking for a condition called retinopathy of prematurity or ROP for short. ROP is when there is abnormal growth of blood vessels of the retina. ROP can cause vision impairment with the most severe cases causing blindness. The treatment for ROP is laser eye surgery.

Cohen had been seen about two weeks ago to check for ROP and there were no signs of it:) The doc said that he didn't see any abnormal growth in Cohen's retina's today either:) but that they also were not fully developed. We will go back after four more weeks so that he can look again. The doc said that ROP develops in about 20% of preemies born around Cohen's gestational age. I also read in his office how preemies also have a higher risk of developing crossed eyes or lazy eye. Oh good, more stuff to look forward to.

To check Cohen's retina, the doc used a small retractor to hold Cohen's eyelids open while the nurse held his hands down. Then the doctor stuck another tool behind his little blue eyes while looking through his magnifying glasses. Watching this was not fun for me and Cohen didn't really like it either. He screamed like I've never heard before, but stopped as soon as it was over. I feel really lucky that we haven't had to have any surgeries thus far.

Cohen goes back to the pediatrician on Thursday to get his weight checked again. I think he's gaining well. His cheecks seem to get fatter everyday. Cohen will be 38weeks gestational age this week! He is starting to be awake a lot more often and I'm excited for him to become more demanding about eating. He definetly wakes up more on his own to eat now than a few weeks ago, but we still have to wake him up once in awhile, which can be difficult sometimes. I am looking forward to him getting a little bigger so that we can go a little longer between feedings. (The doc says we shouldn't go longer than 3 hours between feedings until he gets to 6 lbs). Right now, he's in a nice pattern of cluster feeding during the day, and sleeping longer at night. This is a great pattern and I hope we stay with it.

Also, I put a few new pictures up on the flicker site. The link is on the left side bar of the blog. Enjoy!