Friday, October 21, 2011

There's more than one way to skin a cat!

My five followers may remember mentioning that Randy was diagnosed with failure to thrive in late 2008. Although my rational mind knows that it was due to his numerous hospitalizations and shunt surgeries, there's something very painful in hearing that your child is not thriving due to adequate nutrition. As a mother, it cut like a knife. That was also the beginning of our feeding woes.

Randy went back on NG feeds, but for overnight only. He would pull the tube out a few times a week. He would gag and choke in the middle of the night. He would vomit constantly. But he gained weight and length and the doctors were happy.

April 2009, his pediatrician was concerned that he was only taking stage 2 purees. He sent him to feeding therapy. We worked on desensitizing his hands and mouth. We used techniques to help him tolerate textures. He responded well. In July 2009, he was eating chicken drummette, baked fish, chicken nuggets, soft green beans, soft carrots, crackers, dry cereal along with his purees. Then I went back to work, he went back to daycare and went back to eating baby food.

Feeding is still a battle today. While he eats plenty of foods, they fall into three categories: soft: bread, chicken nuggets, macdonals fries; purée: applesauce, stage 2 Gerber (don't judge me); or crunchy: cereal, chips, crackers. Occasionally, I can coerce him to eat a few bites of spaghetti or beans.

He ate about 1/3 of that dish. But he's growing. I just don't know how nutritionally sound his diet is.

So I'm trying another tactic. I am going to start baking. I'm starting with muffins. I'm putting things like flaxseed, purée squash and carrot, and wheat germ in them. I welcome recipes. Remember his egg white and milk allergy (he can tolerate small amounts in cooked food).

Help me out.

1 comment:

  1. This is our GREATEST struggle with Jacob! How refreshing to see that we are not alone in this area. He eats the SAME foods you listed above. Jacob seems to fatigue though. We still drink pediasure...and he STILL takes it from a bottle. He drinks everything else from a straw...but again would not be able to consume enough without the ease of a bottle. SUPER grateful my docs are cutting us LOTS of slack in this area. Always progress...just at a snails pace and sometimes even going backwards for a bit. Good luck! :0)

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