First "real food"

Lila had a big step today in her road to come home - she got to "eat" real food today (i.e. pumped breast milk). She was allowed to have 5 mLs every 3 hours from a bottle and has tolerated it well so far. If she continues to do well with that amount throughout the night her feeds will be increased to 10 mLs each time tomorrow. The surgical nurse explained to me today that the typical schedule is for her feeds to increase 5 mLs each day as Lila tolerates. Several people (2 surgeons, the surgical nurse, and our nurse) all stressed to me that this is a slow process and often there are "bumps in the road" so no one is giving us an idea as to how much longer we will be there. Lila needs to reach her "goal" volume which is calculated based on her weight, calorie needs, etc. and take it for 3 days before she will be discharged. The surgical nurse estimated that her goal volume might be between 60-80 mLs so based on the 5 mL increase per day, saying there are no setbacks, we are looking at 2-3 more weeks. Our nurse said that often they will increase more than 1 time per day once Lila is taking higher volumes so we are hoping that is the case and we have a shorter stay remaining. We forgot the camera at the hospital so no pictures today, but I will try and post some tomorrow.