We Didn't Expect This at 6 Weeks Corrected

He smiles, a real smile. I don't think you guys really know what that means. Okay, I need to talk quietly because he's sleeping right here. Okay, but this is it. So I was here playing with Lorenzo. I tried to try to train him like with the eyes like look at me here, look at me here, look at me there. The little things that they've told us with his therapy that he's supposed to try to do. So I started to say, you know what? Like that. In that moment, he was like, I said, no way. I love hearing about it. So I keep doing it. And then he smiled. I said, Oh my God, this is a great moment. It was so sad in that moment, you know, but I was expecting his smile. I was just trying to train him like in the next couple of days, maybe I can see something, but he act like smile. In that moment, you wake up. So I said, perfect. So I go there and I tell you, Amore, come here and try just to smile to him. Tell me what he did. So I came here and I was like, and he was just like, so Alessio said, I'll back up a little bit and move to the side. He did with his little eyes. It made me so happy. I said, oh my goodness. And then he went huge, huge smile. And his little arms and legs were kicking. It was magical. It made my heart explode. Yeah, it was beautiful. And I'm so happy we're both there, like almost the exact same moment. I'm just sad we didn't actually capture it. I was thinking in the beginning, but we'll just leave the moment. It's okay, there are going to be many more smiles to come. So many smiles to come, but why is this so important? Obviously, a baby's first smile in general is a beautiful moment. Because he's six weeks. People maybe always confuse why we say six weeks if he's born like three months ago. Sorry, four months ago. We don't even know what day. What it means. I just know age because a lot of people. Yeah, let's explain. Let's explain. So I've tried to explain this a couple of times in the past, but I think it's really hard for people to understand unless you have a preemie. And even if you have like a late term preemie, like one born 34 weeks or whatever, it's totally different than, for example, Lorenzo being born at 26 weeks and five days. So when you have a premature baby, they have an actual age and a corrected or adjusted age. Their actual age is the age that they are from birth. For example, he was born in February. That will always be his birthday because that is the day he was born. Definition of a birthday. Yeah. His adjusted age comes into play when he hits his due date, which for him was May 9th. So he didn't hit his adjusted age zero until May 9th. Before that, for the three months he was in the NICU, it was like he was developing in utero. So when he was born, he was 26 weeks gestational age. Then a month later, he's 30 weeks gestational age, but one month actual. When he's two months old, it's like he's 34 weeks. When he was three months old, it's like he's 38 weeks. Then when he hits that 40 weeks, he is corrected age zero because at that point he's caught up to the place developmentally, physically, mentally, all of his systems, like any born term baby. Hopefully I'm explaining that well enough. From that moment, we still track his actual age, but then you start the baby milestones. Like you say, okay, at one month, they should be doing this. Two months, they should be doing that. The six to eight, not six to eight. Six to eight weeks is when a baby's usual first social smile comes in. Obviously, Lorenzo, when he was six weeks old, he was only 32 weeks corrected. He was still learning to breathe, to eat, to digest, to regulate his temperature. He was still in the isolate. There's no way he's going to be social smiling at that age. Now that he's six weeks corrected- Even if in the NICU a little bit was smile, but was reflex. Yes. He was actually known for his little smile in the NICU because he was always smiling. You think it's more like a reflex when they're that age. This was like he locked into us and he smiled because he recognized us and interacted with us. Technically for him, he's six, almost seven weeks corrected age. He is right on track developmentally. Basically, what we'll do with the pediatrician and his therapist for development is they will track his adjusted age and see his milestones based on that time. Right now, we're looking at his milestones for six to eight weeks. Then a month from now, we'll look at his three-month-old milestones and whatever from there, even though right now is over four-month-old. Even because it's a baby from the NICU super early. So Lorenzo is super early. To be like a baby born to get this milestone is really important for us, right? Yeah. Like I said, if you have a preemie, but they're a later gestational age, they catch up a little bit faster to their term baby peers. If your baby is born at 34 weeks, obviously, that's still a month and a half early, very much a preemie. But they're going to catch up faster than, for example, a baby that's born at 26 weeks, because that baby, they're still trying to develop their systems to survive. So for us to see that he is on track developmentally with his corrected age is huge. Because even just, if you think back when we first had him, we described to you guys the percentages of survivability for a 26-weeker. Just the percentage of babies that survive. And then the ones that survive without long-term health complications. And then the ones that survive with different things that they struggle with. It's always in the back of your mind when you're like, I don't know how it's going to go. I'm happy that he's alive and healthy. But where is he going to be? How can we help him developmentally? How can we foster this environment that helps him develop? And to see that he's smiled right on time is so huge. It's huge. Because, guys, we are a little bit scared that he doesn't get his milestones. It's normal. Maybe it's a parent thing. But you're always thinking, oh, my God, we have to start the week. He started smiling. And it's sort of something that we're putting on ourselves, like this pressure to try and help him do things. Like Alessio said, you play with him. You do his eyesight. There's a list. So many things that we should be doing. So we feel like, oh, my gosh, we have to do it or we're doing something wrong. Exactly. So you feel responsible for helping. So like you said, to see that he's on it is a huge relief. It's a huge relief. But I need to tell you something, guys. So this morning, I tried to make him smile again because I said, yes, they were so happy. I want to make smile again. So I go there with Lorenzo. I play, play, play. And you know why? Because this was so pink. And he was like, like this. Look at that. I hear. He smiled to the fan. He smiled. But I don't think he smiled to me because the eye contact was to the fan. So I would try to move it. I mean, the eyes looking a little bit wild. It's not that you look just the fan. So emotionally, he was laughing at you trying to get his attention. I guess. So I was so upset that he... Jealous of a fan. I'm jealous of the fan because this morning, he just... I take a video. Yeah. I sent to my mom and my mom said, I think he's laughing to the fan. OK, well, thank you for encouraging me. This fan. Why? Yeah, so super happy for these milestones. But what are his next milestones? We should talk about that because it's like his next path. Yeah, because I was so... Me, personally, I was focusing in the last thing we did. It was the growth spurt. He just hit his six week growth spurt. Tell everybody how it went. That was stressful. So this growth spurt. I'd heard about the six week growth spurt because they have them every so often. And I wasn't sure if he was going to hit it at that time. And we honestly didn't realize that he was hitting it at first. He just started wanting to eat so much constantly. And we were so confused because before that, we had been trying to get him to increase his amounts little by little because he had bad reflux and he would spit up a lot. And we knew that we didn't want to overfeed him. So we were trying to be very careful. And then one day we finished the bottle. He cried for more. I was like, what do we do? Give him a little bit more. I'm like five milliliters more. Five. And then five and then five. He just kept crying and crying. Oh my gosh, what's going on? So we ended up giving him so much that day. 120 milliliters. Yeah, so he was at four ounces. Yes, in 40 minutes because we keep going back and forth to try to warm up the milk in time. So that takes a lot of time. Yeah. And so we ended up looking at what's going on. And then, yeah, because like you said, he was doing it over a lengthy period. I thought, you know, it sounds like cluster feeding, which I feel like is so I've always heard of cluster feeding with breastfeeding. I know bottle fed babies cluster feed too. But for us, it was hard to tell what he because sometimes you have a bottle. You're going to drink it even if you're not hungry. Sometimes you won't drink it. So we were like, what's going on? We looked it up. He sounded like he was on this growth spurt perfectly. He wanted to eat constantly. And then again, guys, the next day, same time in the evening, classic cluster feeding time. He wanted to eat a ton, a ton, a ton. His volumes just skyrocketed. That's what was 600 to 800 milliliters. So we were thinking, OK, we've got to support this growth spurt because we have to make sure that he's getting the quantity he needs to grow. And, you know, we're already super anxious about tracking his milliliters, his weight, all the things. Guys, this week, we are terrible. We've even gotten ourselves all freaked out about how many calories he's burning every day. If he cries too much, we're like, who's burning too many calories? We're a little bit crazy there. I don't know. I tried to get this 30 grams. All the doctors and nurses keep telling us to relax a little bit and look at the big picture. Don't track it day by day. Yes, but. But you and I are like hour by hour here. OK. We are a little bit over the top. I know, I agree. Why? Because he's a preemie, ragazzi. He has to grow. So you need 30 grams per day. I don't care if one day it goes bad, but for a week, seven to seven, need to be 30. This week, we start really bad with the growth spurt. I was thinking, oh, my God, guys. Yeah, like I think it grows proud. OK, it's actually pretty good. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So I would just say. We didn't start off very well at the beginning of the week because we had no. But I see him eating crazy. And one mistake everybody do me personally to have to ask AI. It's not you when they eat the day after they go up the weight. It is what they eat five days in the back or a couple of days in the back. Not five. But yeah. Making the cells, the muscles, the fat, all this. Yeah, because they're using the the the calories from the day for what they born and brought. Plus what they storage in the blood is what they make the mass. So I was expecting big numbers. Guys, seven, 15. Oh, we need to arrive 30 here. So right now we have averaged 25 missing three days. We'll see. Like we said. Yeah, food, food. I need to give him food. I can wait. Wake up, Lorenzo. Wake up. Can you? Daddy need to feed you. Like Angela Gretel. Like same thing. Well, the problem is he's eating more quantity. I was feeling like my milk supply was barely making enough. So I worked really hard to try and increase it with more pumping, more foods, more hydration, everything. I increased it. And then he increased. I need to stay ahead of you. Yeah, we're crazy. But we are super happy for the smile. We are super happy for the milestone. I need to talk about the next milestone. Yeah. Like we said, we're tracking his milestones based on the six to eight weeks right now. So some other things that he's doing, starting to are cooling, like making little sounds different than just crying. He is looking at you. If you talk like he'll recognize. He'll turn his head and hear our voices. If we do his big rattle, he'll turn his head one way or the other. We're working on tummy time. He's doing good, but that definitely needs some work. It's one step at a time. And right now he's right on track for everything he's supposed to be doing. We're so happy and proud of him. And we're just going to keep fostering a good environment for him to develop the best that he can. Exactly. In the meantime, ragazzi, do you know what it means? Buongiorno Lorenzo! Andiamo tagli da mangiare! Andiamo ragazzi!