So, as with most moms, I'm of course in love with my baby ;) While I occasionally feel a bit burnt out over the course of the day, holding him is all the rejuvenation I seem to need.

Likewise, he seems to do much better when I'm holding him once or twice a day. Its nice to know this isn't just fluffy either, as Patri has turned up a multitude of studies about how much better preterm babies do when they're given "kangaroo care." Basically, I just snuggle him on my chest for a half hour or hour twice a day.

So far I've been really happy with most of the nurses here. Of his nurses so far, four have been great, two pretty good, and one scared the hell out of me ;)

The first nurse we met was Susan. She's fantastic. I was scared to try holding the baby because of all of the cords coming off him, but she assured me that it would be okay, and that holding the baby was one of the greatest things I could do for him. She seemed very confident, to really know her stuff, and as she stated, to love her job. I just let her set him in my arms and tried not to move too much. He was clearly unhappy about being pulled out of his bed, but quickly snuggled up into a little ball on my chest. His face relaxed and Susan noted that it was the most content she'd yet seen him.

Every premie at the hospital has a lot of people taking care of them. They have their own team of doctors and nurses. Susan told me that various nurses will be in charge of Tovar, but that the nurses have the option of signing up to be on his "team" to work with him regularly and that some probably would. (He gets a doctor team assigned right away, and it will change every two weeks. I don't know if or how often the nurse teams change)

I asked Susan if she was going to be part of Tovar's team, but as with the other three awesome nurses whom I later asked this of, they all said that they couldn't take primaries because they were training other nurses, but if they could they would love to take Tovar because they "love the little guys," think he's really cute, and like working with Patri and I. All of the four have been very excited whenever I've come in to do kangaroo care and eager to volunteer information and help.

This seems to be the main difference I've noticed between the pretty good and the great nurses: the great nurses just want to see things go well for the babies and the notion of it being more work for them doesn't seem to even cross their minds, whereas the pretty good nurses seem to see spending time dealing with me and taking the baby out as adding to their work load. But even the less enthusiastic nurses are still friendly and seem to care more about their work than the average person.

Even the nurse who was scary wasn't necessarily "bad," she was just very uncomfortable with handling the baby, and in her fear ended up pulling cords a bit and just generally very awkward. At first she actually told me that she didn't think I'd be allowed to hold the baby because of the cords, but I assured her that I'd just done it the prior night, so she went and checked with other nurses and got one to help her take him out. She was our nurse on the second day, so as with her, Patri and I were still very concerned about all those cords, especially given that one goes straight to his heart and another through the umbilicus. (the umbilical line was taken out not long after, so the only super scary line now is the pic line, going to the heart, but its not that scary because they have it secured very well on his arm)

It was so stressful to watch scary nurse handle him that I actually joined Tovar in crying, and Patri and I weren't sure at that point whether the kangaroo care was worth it, enjoyment for the baby and us and studies showing its benefits or no.

However, we have not had any serious problems since then, and I figure that I will just not take him out on that particular nurse's shifts if she works with him again, which I think she will also appreciate ;) Also, I just learned yesterday that Susan has signed up to take Tovar on as a primary!!! I'm very excited to know that he will have at least one awesome nurse, and I'll make sure that I pick her shifts to come visit him :)