Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Gag her with a spoon

Adele seems to be riding the spit-up train again. Sigh... It began last week sometime, when we noticed she was spitting up more than usual. Over the weekend, at G-ma & Papa Pontow's she had several projectile episodes after eating. She also had a few before she ate, which is a new and exciting development.

In addition to that, she seems to be having trouble, well, you know, going number 2. That IS very unusual for her, as she's always been a regular goer. Since it's been awhile now (probably a good week or so) since she's had a nice, um, movement, I called the doctor today. Her advice was to introduce fruits into Adele's diet. We haven't done a whole lot with solid foods so far (just some cereal and bananas), but I did happen to have some pears in the pantry for when we did decide to move on to fruits. So, this afternoon I put the spoon to her mouth and shoveled some in... Adele got a very peculiar look on her face (not unusual since this was her first taste of pears) and promptly projectile vomited her formula all over herself, the Bumbo and the dining room table. (And this was the second shirt of the day, since she'd already puked all over herself once today.) I get her cleaned up, and even give her a bath since she's awfully sticky. Figure I'll give it another shot (yes, I am officially nuts or hopelessly optimistic) and get her all loaded into the Bumbo again. Get another spoonful into her mouth and we get a repeat projectile performance. Sigh...

So there we are. Poor baby can't go to the bathroom and yet I can't get anything in her that will help her go. She's not drinking as much formula and when she does drink, she ends up throwing half of it up again. I have a theory that the lack of movement is making her tummy upset and/or she's so backed up there's no where for it to go. Makes sense to me anyway. But how are we supposed to give her any relief in the meantime? And then I worry that she'll get dehydrated or lose weight again. Yuck.

My other theory is that she's teething. Mom remembers me going through a huge spitting-up spurt when I teethed, so maybe she's going through the same thing? I can feel a hard ridge under her bottom gums, but nothing that would indicate teeth are ready to burst through.

Luckily Friday brings our day of doc appointments so we can get some input on everything. OH! Speaking of doc appointments, Monday was her audiology appointment (because of her failed hearing screen) and she's just fine. Both ears passed with flying colors.

Today and tomorrow we're heading out to interview some potential daycares. One of them comes highly recommended from two folks, so I have high hopes. Keep your fingers crossed!

In other developmental news, she's mastered the fine art of rolling both ways. She's never in the same position we lay her down in. We've also heard some "ma-ma-ma" and "na-na-na" sounds. She's not real consistent with her "talking" but now that we know she can hear, we're not too worried. (I know what you're thinking: She probably can't get a word in edgewise.)

So, all in all, she's doing fine and seems to be happy and healthy. We're very lucky that this digestive stuff is the worst of our problems, it seems.

5 comments:

Liz Jimenez said...

As I'm sure you know, rice cereal and bananas can both cause #2 problems. I haven't started my kids on solids yet (bought spoons today, though!), but we had poop issues before. My pedi recommended 1 tsp of prune juice combined with their usual bottle, two times per day. Works like a charm. Both are pretty predictable now, and no more screaming fits before pooping. Don't you just love motherhood?

Oh, and if you try it, beware: prune juice makes for messier spitup. My kids are pretty spitty, too. Nice.

Anonymous said...

Hi Darrah,
Jen Johnson here. I can't say that we ever had poop issues with Lucas, rather I had to make sure he had apples/bananas in him to ensure solid movements. Our friends had the opposite issue and couldn't feed their little ones apples or bananas for a very long time otherwise there was no movement at all.
I will say he had terrible reflux though. I finally talked my pediatrician into meds when he was 9 months (adjusted) and he was on Prilosec until 1.5 yrs when I was able to ween him off. We noticed when we would miss a dose or two too and there would high volume output (orally)! I'm not sure that it helps, but I remember those days and feel for you. Have you tried Prilosec? It is a pain b/c it is an oral dose that has to be made up by a specific formula at certain pharmacies, remain refrigerated and only lasts for about 30 days. But, it did the trick and his reflux really reduced after starting and using it.

Anonymous said...

Hey Darrah, this is Jessica from BBC. Charlie was having issues pooping and we just added about 1-2 tbsp of karo syrup (light kind) into his regular bottle. He liked it cuz it thickens it up and it works. Just use it in each bottle until it clears it out.

Lindi Ben said...

Gosh, so much to comment on. Sorry to hear the spit-up is back. Hopefully your appointments today will give you some answers. After Izzy's 5-7 day dry (or shall I say "paste") period, she cleaned it all out of her system a few days after the prune juice and 1 day after 2 doses of the corn syrup in her bottle. I'm gonna stick w/ the latter I think because of the mess factor, which your friend commented on, too.

I'm soooo happy to hear she passed her hearing test in both ears! I was really waiting to hear those results. Yippee!!!

Hope you have a relaxing weekend after all these appointments!

Lindi Ben said...

Ps - What a bummer to clean her up after spitting, eating, spitting, eating. An hour later, you wonder where the time goes.