9 month rundown

where do i begin?

He is Sweet, Handsome, Smart, Funny, and i love him with all my heart.

he's just about 28 inches tall (as of the 17th of Feb)..and 16 Pounds.

He is perfect. His Diaphragm just didnt form. thats what i always say.

He didnt get to use his instincts to eat when he was first born... didnt get a chance to try until he was about a month old.. so he learned how Not to eat. so now we are spendin our days trying to teach him how.

Sense he has a Gtube, he is able to get his nutrition when he doesnt feel like eating the rest of his bottle. Thank Goodness for the Gtube!

when he is teething and doesnt want to eat, we can still make sure he gets fed.

but he learns that food will appear in his stomach.

we used to think that 'well he will eat if he is hungry.. we'll just wait it out.' doesnt work
we've tried everything
he is perfectly happy with an empty stomach.

For the first 11 days of his life he was intubated. a tube down his mouth, through his vocal chords.. controlling his breathing.

he would be suctioned (hard to watch... hard to even talk about) who knows how many times a day... everything this poor baby knew when it came to his mouth was he Did Not want anything near it.

who could blame him.

he was fed only through a feeding tube for 24 days. when we finally were allowed to try to feed him by mouth... all night still, he would be tube fed with the nurses.. doesnt sound like great practice to me..

we didn't know that eating was going to be such an obstacle. no one told us.

At nine months old, he will eat Usually 45-50 mls at every feed. (every 3 hours) definately not enough to be healthy. so we Tube him the remaining ounces.

I am glad we have the Gtube. he needs to grow big and strong so his lungs, brain, everything can grow.

everyday we practice with solids. he sits in his high chair with his own spoon... and a toy (eating therapists say so, so dont get all crazy..haha;) he needs to develop a Good relationship with food. even if he doesn't eat it, he is playing and having fun, and if its all over him, you Know that some is getting in his mouth.

we've been practicing this for 3 days now and already (sometimes) he will even open his mouth for a spoonful that i feed him!

he used to not do that. he would turn his head. (going back to his instincts of not wanting anything near his mouth.)

we read something our OT (feeding therapist) gave us that was a lightbulb, that everyone i think needs to hear..

".. Many people believe that eating is completely instinctual and that no matter what happens a child will eat. This is another myth in the food world. Actually instincts only start the process, and that is if you are lucky enough not to have your instincts not interfered with by prematurity, a physical disorder, or disrupteive procedures needed for survival. Eating is, in reality, a learned behavior. just as children learn to eat, so can children be taught to not eat by the circumstances of their lives..."

this just made so much sense to us, because we were like other people in the beginning.. just thinking, that if he gets hungry, then he will just have to eat. but poor guy doesn't want to. its not enjoyable to him like it is to the rest of us.

So the new thing we are doing along with the spoon, his toy in his highchair with his food, is tubing him at the same time. (we hide the pump around the corner of the hallway so he cant see that it is there..) this way he will hopefully make the connection that when he is 'eating' he is getting full... when he has this food in his mouth, the hungry feeling goes away..

we wish we knew this at four months old.

we wish we knew that eating would even be a problem in the first place!

we wish the hospital even let him eat 5 mls... 2mls! anything, as soon as that breathing tube came out..... they had their resons though... sence he has a small lung, they didnt want to tire him..and we didnt know to ask if we could try to get him to eat, because we didnt know that would be an issue later. we just wanted him to heal up and get off nitrous.. among other things that were of main concern at the moment.

we also have to be grateful that it is ONLY feeding that he is having trouble with.

he will get it eventually, and just like the feeding tube down his nose ry and i had to put in every time he pulled it out... this too will be a thing of the past.

He is so active and happy, and no can tell he went through so much just by looking at him.

I wish his diaphragm did form. but its ok that it didnt. it makes him who he is and makes all of us real strong in the end.