7 weeks premature

[CoolBananas21]

My baby daughter was born 7 weeks early (thanks to Covid and being in ICU) and she is perfectly healthy thank god.

I wanted to know if anyone else has had premature baby and if they can offer any experience advice on their development?

She is now 7 pound, still looks like a new born and I just wanted to see what kind of delay we might be looking at with any behaviours etc although I know each child is different.

Thank you! X

Aww mine was 7 weeks early too. I would use corrected age (ie how old they would be if came on due date) for milestones until around 1.5/2 years. He is 2.5 now and just use actual age now as he's not behind at all any more. It's a long road with a preemie as they are in the new born stage for so much longer. I found from 6 months things got a lot easier x

Thank you for this. Just good to hear from other people who have had the same experience.

She has really bad reflux too which I'm sure will last longer as her due date was yesterday bless her. X

Happy due date for yesterday :-) yes my little one had reflux too. It's really hard. All the puking and not wanting to lay flat. It will gradually get better and better though, once he got to six months it pretty much went. Being able to go into the seat part of the pram at that age (rather than lay flat) helped too. My one was happiest in a stretchy wrap / carrier, so he was upright, do you have anything like that?

Reflux is very common in preemies I've realised!

Yes 100% - nowhere flat, and sometimes she has milk come out her nose and I swear she stops breathing for 2 seconds and then she's fine but it's scary to see.

I have a carrier and a bouncer but she's too small for them both, she needs to be 8 pound but I'm sure when I can use them she will like it.

We have the 6-8 week check up tomorrow so will mention this to them.

Thank you for replying to me - makes me feel less anxious about everything. X

You could try a boba stretchy wrap, mine was in it straight after coming home from SCBU and he was under 5 pounds. Was a lifesaver!

It's a very anxious time, you sound like you're doing really well :-) x

Was your baby at darenth? As mine was SCBU too. Yes I was going to buy one of those but wasn't sure how confident I'd be with it. I've been given a baby Bjorne carrier but might buy a sling till she gets a bit bigger.

Thank you I'm getting there x

Yeh the wrap is good for when they're little. It takes a little bit of practice but is very easy really. You'll get it in no time.

We didn't have the 6-8 week check due to lockdown, I'm glad it's getting back to normal. Remember to emphasise that they are technically a newborn and that corrected age should be used. Some health professionals are better at understanding preemies than others. In terms of milestones my son smiled at exactly 6 weeks corrected age. So 13 weeks actual age (which would have been quite late). x