u/TokenYeti658

My husband went camping recently with a big group of friends. Since we’re vegan and they usually cook eggs for breakfast, I sent him with a big pack of homemade instant oatmeal packets. I developed these recipes based on a few examples I saw online and in cookbooks (both for bulk dry mixes and for just conventional oatmeal). They’re as simple as the Quaker instant flavoured packets, but way more satisfying (~400-500 calories each).

Apparently this was the favoured breakfast for the trip since it was so easy to make and they’re genuinely delicious. There are no more camping trips in the schedule, but I’m going to continue making these and other flavours as convenient breakfasts and snacks to have on hand. I divided them into individual bags, but you could also make one big jar and portion out as needed to enjoy at home. The last photo is of the maple brown sugar … obviously the photo doesn’t do it justice, it’s instant oatmeal!

I made some dessert waffles last week with homemade chocolate sauce and peanut butter chocolate fudge (peanut butter, vanilla, salt, coconut oil melted together with a couple chocolate chips swirled in, chilled then cut into cubes). I had a small amount of both leftover but no waffles, so I used it to top my usual overnight oats, also with banana and raspberries. It was incredible. This is my go to oats recipe:

45 g rolled oats
8 g chia seeds
175 g unsweetened soy milk
1 tsp maple syrup (or 1/2 mashed banana)
Pinch salt

My husband left a wet hot pink post-it note on our counter and it’s left this crazy stain. The counter was already unevenly discoloured but is it really a goner now? 😬

Staying at a vacation rental and bought bare bones groceries to for the week. I stocked large flake oats, oat milk and brown sugar to make the simplest and most comforting oatmeal. It’s been hitting!

It’s been 13 months since I experienced PPROM at 28 weeks and delivered my son at 29 weeks. He is my first child and first pregnancy.

He was intubated about 12 hours after he was born and remained intubated for 8 days, including a couple days on the jet. Progress was slow and steady until he suddenly came down with sepsis at 6 weeks old. He came home at 65 days and was gaining weight at an acceptable rate while bottle feeding pumped breastmilk, but our greatest accomplishment was transitioning to exclusively nursing at 3 months old. Once we made that switch, he started to catch up and is now in the 3rd percentile for his actual age.

I felt so anxious for the first two months he was home, but we put one foot in front of the other and focused on enjoying our baby. And we have enjoyed him so much! He had some intense reflux in the first couple months home that we treated with prescription medication.

I started seeing a psychiatrist who focuses on postpartum near the end of baby’s hospital stay. Once baby was discharged, he started coming to appointments with me, and it’s been so helpful to process the pain of the NICU experience with the joy of everything else.

I’m in Canada where we receive 12-18 months of maternity leave, and it’s been the best year of my life. We live in the capital city and baby has now visited every national museum. We frequent various playgroups and baby storytimes in our area and baby loves going to cafes to people watch.

We did BLW and he eats solids well, though he has an allergy to cashews that we are working on treating with oral immune therapy.

For the first 6 months home, baby would barely let anyone else hold him, including his dad. He’s since warmed up to spending time with other family, and of course his first word is ‘’dada’’. He only contact naps and loves to be in the carrier.

We have neonatology follow up appointments every few months to assess his development and at the 8 month corrected appointment he was determined to have a gross motor delay since he wasn’t showing any signs of readiness to crawl, pull to stand or sit independently for longer than a few seconds. We started going to a paediatric physiotherapy clinic near us and his progress has been great. His gross motor skills have caught up but we’ll continue physio until he’s walking.

Ironically, I’m in (pelvic floor) physio as well to work through the lasting effects of having multiple cervical exams while I was in premature labour, and less than 1 cm dilated. This is one of the most surprising and disappointing long term effects of the experience, given that I had an uncomplicated spontaneous vaginal birth that involved 20 minutes of pushing to deliver a 3 lb baby.

I’m sending love and positive thoughts to everyone in the NICU right now. It’s such a hard road and I hope for the best outcomes for your families.