Elecare Again

Karen (OT) suggested yesterday that we get Ian back on Elecare. Have I mentioned that for the last couple of months she hasn't addressed his feeding issues At All? She's just waiting for the feeding team. It's frustrating. When I feel guilty that I've failed Ian in some way (because I haven't been able to get him to eat table food), it does help to remind myself that an OT who has professional training in this area also hasn't been able to help much over the past year. She threw in the towel a few months ago and says we'll get back to working on feeding issues after he's discharged from the hospital. She didn't work on anything for about five weeks, but the last two weeks she's been working with him on some sensory issues as well as motor planning (because he still can't come down the stairs safely without assistance). When she walked in the door yesterday and asked how things were going, I burst into tears. It's been incredibly stressful the past week beacuse he was hardly eating anything. In fact for the first time in his life, he was even showing resistance to drinking his "milk." He was going 5 hours without peeing whereas normally he pees every 1-2 hours.

Last night I bought 4 cans of Elecare on eBay. Hopefully the seller shipped them out today. I also asked the Allergist if they had a sample can of Elecare I could have for Ian. I picked one up today as well as a prescription for Vanilla Elecare Jr. for the next 6 months. Yesterday I made an appointment for this coming Wednesday with WIC to fill out the paperwork so that Elecare can be shipped directly to our house (for free!!!). We spent hundreds of dollars on Elecare this summer. What a blessing it will be to get it for free over the next 6 months. I just stocked up on almond milk yesterday, but I can use that to make pudding for him once the Elecare arrives in the mail (from eBay and then WIC). It's SUCH a relief to know that his nutritional needs will be met even if I only get 10 bites of applesauce down his throat over the course of the day. In light of the fact it's really hurting him to swallow right now, I think until his esophagus heals I'm not going to push the feeding program on him. It hasn't worked over the past 10 months. Why put him through the agony? The intensive feeding program will be starting in a few weeks. I'm very tired of doing battle four times a day over each bite; a little break sounds heavenly to me.

Ian had a really bad day today in terms of potty training. The only other day he had this many accidents in one day was the first day of potty training. The last few weeks he's been having 1-2 accidents a week. He had four accidents today. He drank a TON of almond milk today. Everytime I put him on his froggy potty, he peed. Two of his accidents were poop. They were REALLY awful to clean up because his bowels have been loose over the past week. Today was his first poop accident in a long time. Yuck. I'd take changing a poopy diaper over poopy underwear, pants, legs, socks, etc. any day of the week. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day. It certainly caught me off guard.

I had intended to include one other thing on the thankful list yesterday. I am grateful that the dentist put my crown back in on Monday afternoon - at no charge.

Paul's parents watched the kids this afternoon. I had an appointment with an advisee at 2:30, but she was a no show. I had a brief faculty meeting (30 minutes long) at 3:00. On the way home I stopped at the consignment shop to pick up the items they still had that hadn't sold yet. I had asked them to pull them last week. There weren't too many things left, but I was still grateful to reclaim a few things, like some receiving blankets. If I could go back in time, I wouldn't have sold things (eBay, Craigslist, consignment shop, and yard sale) or given things away. Thankfully I didn't sell/give away everything. I still have some clothes in every size and other things like a highchair, pack n play, etc. When were starting this round of ivf I assumed that when we found out the gender I'd give away all the clothes for the other gender. Since we have one frozen embryo, I don't plan to give away or sell anything until we find out if that future transfer results in a pregnancy or not. The first thing I'm going to need to replace is the pregnancy body pillow. I gave that to the thrift store last year. I'm not going to replace everything. I can definitely live without a Bumbo, for example. I'm going to try to get most of what I do need through yard sales, Craigslist, and consignment shops. I'm going to try to keep my list as short as possible, although I am planning to buy one thing that I didn't have for Ian or Nadia - an exersaucer. Those are a dime a dozen at yard sales, and I've seen that quite a few kids do get a lot of use out of those things. Another thing I know I definitely need to buy are two Boppys. I still have my Steeler boppy cover, but I sold my boppy pillows. Those are necessities in my opinion! It's so exciting to be thinking about what I need for baby #3. I regret that I didn't save everything from Nadia and Ian, but it's water under the bridge at this point. I truly thought we were done having kids. I am so very glad that we weren't! PTL!