Avoided Dehydration

As I've mentioned before, when Ian gets a runny nose he throws up ALL day long. The vomiting started on Tuesday night and was out of control on Wednesday and Thursday. It was so bad on Thursday that I left messages with his OT (Karen), GI NP (Beth), and Pediatrician. He had already lost more than 1/2 a pound, and on Thursday he went almost 5 hours without wetting his diaper. The Pediatrician suggested spraying his nose with saline and then aspirating his nose 5 minutes before feeding him. They also suggested giving him 1 tsp of Pedialyte every 5 minutes until he resumed wetting his diaper. He still threw up some from the Pedialyte, but he did keep down more of that than he had of what I normally give him. Beth didn't agree with aspirating his nose because she said if that causes him to cry (which it does) that would create more mucus.

I discussed with Karen and Beth how to give him is Prevacid because that was also causing him to vomit, which meant it wasn't actually going down his throat. Karen suggested giving it to him when he first woke up (before he had anything in his belly). Beth suggested immediately squirting some juice in his mouth after the Prevacid to wash it down in the hopes that then he wouldn't gag. We tried that this morning, and it worked! We used Pedialtye this morning, but once that bottle is opened you're supposed to toss it after 48 hours so tomorrow we'll use juice instead. He does like the Grape flavored Pedialyte, which surprised me because Nadia won't drink Pedialyte.

From Monday through Thursday I couldn't get Ian to eat more than 1-2 bites a day of solid food. Considering how well he did on Saturday and Sunday, I was very frustrated, actually to the point of tears. I have been trying to feed Ian by spoon for almost 10 months, and some days it feels like we haven't made any progress in that time. The truth is that we have made some progress in that for the first few months ALL baby food made him gag and now there are quite a few that he can tolerate if we succeed in actually getting the spoon in his mouth. Also, he is now putting some foods in his mouth (albeit to lick them), which is a big change, and he recently made the switch from bottles to sippy cups. The good news is that with my mom's help we've been able to feed him 2 containers of baby food over the past 2 days. I have to say though that sometimes it still feels like there is no light at the end of the tunnel. I know in my head that some day he'll be eating, but it feels like it's never going to happen. We have to work so hard to distract him to get him to eat a little bit of baby food.

Friday he didn't throw up as much as he had the previous two days, which was a big relief. This morning didn't start out well. Hopefully the rest of the day will go better - for Ian's sake, my mom's carpet's sake, etc. I am grateful that even though we're away from our home, we still have access to a washing machine. I'm hoping that his weight doesn't drop any farther as it takes so long to get the weight back on him. If he does, he'll probably weigh the same at his 15 month doctor appt that he did on his 12 month appt.

In talking with Beth we got the results of Ian's bloodwork. She said she was really surprised. She thought based on what we had been feeding him plus how many times a day he poops plus how pale his skin is that he would be anemic, etc. His hemoglobin was excellent as was his albumin, Vitamin D, etc. She was expecting him to show up as being malnourished, but she said she was wrong. The only level that was "off" was the one that indicates that he has some allergies (to what we don't know). I'm going to mention this to his Pediatrician in a couple of weeks and see if we can get him tested by an allergist, and I'm hoping that doesn't mean we have to make another trip to Philadelphia. We are planning to go on April 19 for him to see the urologist and then have the upper GI x-ray (which they said takes from 2-6 hours to complete so I'm going to leave Nadia at home with Paul's parents that day).