First night failure

Last night was Andrea's full first night away from Emmett. Tomorrow Emmett will turn 10 months, so that is quite a few consecutive nights. Andrea left around 10am, and didn't return until after 3pm today, so for 29 hours ours was an all-male house. The trick for her absence was going to be milk feedings. For the past few months Emmett has been going to Andrea's school for feedings so he hasn't needed a bottle for some time. Andrea had prepared a store of milk for this occasion in the freezer and I had to just make sure and manage the supply while she was gone. Emmett fed pretty well on the bottle, but just before his afternoon nap he was pretty pooped and didn't finish a bottle. I should mention here my defrosting practice: I heat about 2 cups of water to 150ish, put the container of frozen milk in it for a little while, and feed the kid. Now, as any mother who goes through the hassle of pumping stores of milk will tell you, pumped milk is valued slightly higher than gold, so when Emmett couldn't finish the bottle due to tiredness I (knowing I shouldn't be doing this) decided to keep the remaining part of the bottle in the refrigerator since Emmett would probably only sleep for 1 hour or so and since the bacteria that could cause problems probably wouldn't make much progress in colonizing the bottle in that time in the cold refrigerator. I am pretty sure this was the wrong choice.

Emmett woke, I gave him the bottle, took him for a long walk, fed him, bathed him, and put him to bed by 7pm and everything seemed hunky dory. At about 9:30 I heard him cry a little and go back to sleep. Then a few minutes later he did the same thing. I checked him on the monitor (the best investment we have made in raising this kid) and saw that there was a huge patch of what looked like vomit next to Emmett's head. I went into his room to find one of the saddest scenes I have seen in some time with Emmett trying to find a way to position himself to sleep with a pool of vomit all over the sheet, his sleep sack, and his head. I felt so horrible for him and he was so sad---not crying really but just confused and whining. Holding him in my arms he felt so weak and lifeless, and was a far different baby than the one I had put to bed a few hours previously. As I worked to clean him up, his body would convulse every few minutes as another wave of nausea hit him, he would be unable to breathe, and after it passed he would go limp in my arms and would wimper a little bit. This pattern continued with longer stretches between the nausea spells (which quickly turned to dry heaves), and as they intermissions stretched longer he was able to sleep a little in my arms between. By about 11:15 it had all passed and he slept on top of my chest. Finally at 12:30 I put him into bed and watched him until 1am when I was convinced that he was okay, then I went to bed, too.

At 4:00 he was up and was crying. I had spent much of the night trying to decide the course of action for getting him hydrated and fed once again and figured since he had slept so long with no vomiting that I would give him a couple of sips of water and then watch for a reaction. I did this, took him for a pre-dawn walk, and he kept it all down. I returned to the house for an increased dose of water and headed out for a longer walk. The whole time it was easy to tell that he wasn't feeling so hot, but he would look at me and smile every once-in-a-while and it made it seem like we were making progress. We continued this process until 7:00 (I think I gave him a cracker, too), and by that time he was drinking more water out of a cup than I have seen---actual continuous gulps of water with none spilling out the sides. I put him down for a nap and then debated whether I should try giving him more of the frozen milk. I figured already that the odds were pretty good that it was the twice-used bottle that had done it, but there was a little worry that it was some other food item that I had given him. When he woke, I gave him the milk (in a cup, no less, and he drank it right up), moved on to solids, and didn't look back. He made it through the day a little whinier than normal but in pretty good spirits.

It was funny that while he was really sick there was a part of me that kind of liked the sick Emmett as he would lay into me or continually try to climb up my leg if I sat him down on the floor. It felt like, for once, I was more than just the delivery guy who takes him to his mom for feedings and, secretly, I hoped that my being there in his time of need would raise me a little closer to the pedestal he keeps his mother on. We will see. He definitely was at his happiest today the moment his mom got home.