Week 29: Teething (and coughing)

Lemon hit an important milestone this week--he got his first tooth!  And no, I don't have a picture of it yet.  Trust me, taking a photograph while holding an infant still with one hand and holding his mouth open with the other hand is not as easy as it sounds.  If you have any doubts, I recommend that you try it with a similarly sized and similarly cooperative creature, such as housecat.

The other thing we've noticed this week is that Lemon is definitely coughing more.  I wouldn't say that he has "a" cough, in that it's not especially regular, and he doesn't cough in his sleep.  But he definitely coughs when he wakes up, and then occasionally throughout the day in a way that he didn't use to.  It's not a scary-sounding cough, though, and he's in great spirits and not acting sick or feverish, so I assume (hope?) that everything is OK.  We have an appointment at the clinic next Friday so we'll see what they say.  At the moment I think this may just be part of growing up.  Babies don't have very thick secretions in the lung (or so we were told when Lemon was diagnosed) and they get thicker with age.  So, maybe, like getting his first tooth, this is just a normal part of a CF baby getting older.  Still, it's troubling, because for most of his life to date we've been able to put CF out of our minds most of the time, and now every time he coughs, I immediately think, "Oh no, CF, poor Lemon, we need a cure faster!"

In the time when I'm not worrying about CF, which is still the majority of the time, Lemon is having lots of fun practicing new skills, and bringing out Papa Bear's creative side.

Look at this cool tower!

(Lemon thinking, "Oh man, if only I could move!  Maybe if I lean waaaay forward...")

















Kaboom! 

 And so forth.  Hours of innocent merriment.

Another great thing about this week is that we didn't explain the concept of daylight savings time to Lemon.  So, although he thinks he's still waking up at 5, it's actually 6!  I'm sure after a few days this will feel like an improvement, although at the moment it still feels like 5 to me, too.

One other funny side note this week--I have achieved a new internet milestone, in that someone that I don't even known tweeted at me.  This has never happened to me before, so, yes, I will admit that it was kind of fun.  And, the news this person shared with me is that this blog (yes, the one you are reading right now) is one of the top 35 CF blogs on the internet (according to someone).  It's good to know that the reach of the blog is expanding, but mainly I'm just honored to be on the same page as everyone else on the list--we are all in this fight together, and they are all fighting so hard and finding the time to share their experiences with the world.  It's inspiring (if scary) reading.