Eric and Lisa

My doctor's appointment today went very well. I woke up this morning feeling much better, which was a good sign, and after examining me, the doctor thought that everything looked OK. I don't know what the problem was, and neither did she, but the important thing is that it seems to have passed. So, I'm sticking to the nursing for now. Hallelujah! We gave Ian some formula last night to supplement one of his meals since I didn't have enough to feed him, and man, that stuff stinks!!! It was amazing how just the smell of it could turn me off like that and motivate me to keep on nursing as long as possible. I'm so thankful that things are working better today and I can put off the thought of weaning him for a little while longer.

The past couple of weeks, Ian and I have been going to the IU Optometry School once a week to help out with research on babies' vision development. Today, Ian had a VEP (Visual Evoked Potential) test done to measure his level of acuity. In the VEP, electrodes were mounted over the visual part of Ian's brain, kind of like an EKG, but attached to the back of his head. He sat in front of a television screen where a pattern of lines was presented. A toy was dangled in front of the television to attract his attention to the center of the screen. The visual evoked potential is the electrical response of the brain to a simple patterned stimuli. The VEP stimulus alternates: the black bars become white, the white bars become black, and the stripes become narrower and narrower. In a ten-second trial the gratings go from very wide to very narrow. The big ones make big signals and the small ones make smaller signals until you can no longer distinguish them from the ongoing electrical activity of the brain. A calculation was then done to fit a line to the data in order to come up with an estimate of acuity. It was a really interesting test, and apparently, Ian is right on schedule for babies his age. It was cool to see on the graphs at the end of the experiment how the visual portion of his brain reacted strongly to the wide, dark lines, but had less activity while the thin, light lines were on the screen. Below are two pictures the optometrist took during the experiment. You can click on them for a bigger view.

--Lisa

Hey, things are going much better than a week or so ago. My PUPPP rash has all but disappeared, and I'm starting to feel more normal. Hallelujah! I'm really thankful for the prayers that have gone up for me -- thank you to all who spent time on my behalf.

My mom (Denise) is here today to hang out with me and Ian. Having her come gives me a good chance to get some things done that I don't normally have time to do. God bless both grandmas! Ian is so blessed to have two grandmas who dote so much on him and are so loving. It will be great for him to grow up knowing both sets of grandparents.

Well, it's been another interesting week in the Oglesbee household! For some reason or another, I've contracted a rash known in the U.S. as PUPPP -- Pruritic urticarial papules and plaques of pregnancy -- which usually occurs towards the end of pregnancy, but I've been "lucky" enough to get it five weeks later. It's not a very common condition; it happens to about 1 out of every 140-260 women in their initial pregnancies. If you're interested (which I don't know why you would be), here's a website that tells all about the lovely condition: dermatology.about.com/cs/pregnancy/a/puppp.htm

However, itchiness and all, we had a very nice Memorial Day weekend. We were able to go up to northern Indiana and spend a day or two with each set of parents (Ian's grandparents). It was kind of an impromtu trip -- on Thursday night, we realized we had no plans for the weekend and the thought of staying at home all three days made us feel stir-crazy, so we decided to go visit our families again! It was really a lovely visit with both sets. Ian did much better schedule-wise this time, although, he seemed noticably glad to be home.

Today, Eric went back to work after the long weekend, and this evening, I start "working" for the first time since Ian was born! I'm currently only tutoring two students, but I hope to build up my clientele as the summer goes on. It will be nice to ease into working again. I'm looking foward to seeing how the summer unfolds!

Nine days later, and Baby Ian is doing splendidly! He's such a good baby and is surprising the heck out of us by sleeping through the night. We wonder if that will last. Although, he does seem like he's on a fairly regular schedule of feeding/waking/sleeping. He's a very docile baby and often doesn't complain even when his diaper is rather messy, so we have to work hard to keep on top of things. It's a good challenge, though. We are having so much fun with him.

His mommy is still struggling a little bit, though. I tore a lot during the rather quick delivery, so I'm still pretty sore. On Thursday, I had to make an impromtu visit to the Ob/Gyn to take care of some infection and pulled stitches, but I think I'm on the road to recovery. I still can't walk or sit real well, but it's getting better everyday. Maybe soon, I'll be able to eat dinner at the dining room table instead of on a comfy chair in the living room! The doctor said my recovery will be about two weeks longer than it would have been without the infection or pulled stitches, but that's ok. I'm just glad I have a healthy baby!