Almost home

Papa-daddy again.

Mr. Monkey continues to show great improvement, so much so that they're talking about letting him come home tomorrow! He's now breastfeeding like a total pro and gaining weight at an impressive rate.

But the best news of the day came from the neuro consult. Fausto passed his physical exam with flying colors, his cranial ultrasound showed no problems, and the attending neurologist said that the longterm prognosis is excellent. The "event" seems clearly related to the dehydration and hypoglycemia and not the result of in inherent neurological problem or infection.

That last part is important because it helped convince one of Fausto's neonatologists to go head to head with the cowboys in Infectious Diseases who were insisting on a complete course of IV antibiotics. Dr. Kumar (seriously, that's his name! though we didn't ask him about White Castle) was able to face them down and get Fausto off the drugs, which was important because the IV was ruining vein after vein and the drugs themselves can cause vascular damage. And of course there's the added benefit of freeing him up to return home!

We're still waiting on the results of the brain MRI they did this afternoon and the EEG scheduled for tomorrow, but once those are complete, he should be good to go. And provided those both come back normal, as the neurologist thinks likely, the odds of there being permanent brain damage are very slim. Given the gut-wrenching emotional roller coaster we've been on, I'm cautiously optimistic, but the sea-monkey mama's maternal intuition says he's going to be just fine.