More Medical Mumbo-Jumbo

Today consisted of two different Dr. appointments.

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First was Mika's Orthopedic, Dr. Siegel (finally!). It was waaaaaay back in January when our pediatrician, Dr. Cunningham, told us we should probably go see her because Mika was looking pigeon-toed. To refresh your memory, we also needed to make another appointment for her hips to be checked at about 21 months because of her hip dysplasia so we just lumped it all in now.

So, should I give you the bad news or the bad news first?

OK, I'll start with the bad news.

Mika's x-ray on her hips show that they are not progressing as we would like. I don't fully understand all the angles and such, but I know that at 1 year we wanted the angles to be less that 30% and at 2 years they want them to be less than 20%. At 1year they measured 28% and 27%. Well, now 8 months later they still measure 28% and 27%. Not good.

As far as the other bad news goes, Dr. Siegel explained that when a kid is pigeon-toed they look to see what joint/bone is causing it: is it the hips, tibia, or feet themselves? We already know Mika's hips aren't perfect, so that is a little bit of our problem. Most of it is her tibia's, however. Her right isn't as bad as her left, but they both still turn in.

So, here is what comes next: We are going to first deal with the feet. Dr. Siegel has prescribed what is called a Denis Browne Splint for Mika. I believe she wants to be this aggressive because a) we need to deal with the hips as well, and b) Mika's getting to an age where she can get out of/take off braces and splints. She will only wear this at night. We have an evaluation with the prosthetic/orthopedic people tomorrow to get Mika fitted and find out more about her wearing it.

At this point here next appointment is in 6 months, when she'll be 26 months old (2 years and 2 months for those of you who need it broken down). Looking back on that I'm not sure if it was a mistake, or if she really doesn't need to be seen with the Denis Browne Splint for 6 months. If the people tomorrow don't have any insight into this I'll call Dr. Siegel's office back and ask them.

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As for Urijah, he had his weight check today. He is a whopping 13lbs10.5oz!!! Eat boy, eat!!! I can't tell you exactly how much he's gained 'cause I can't find my record right now, but if I do, I'll update this post. The only bad thing is that I've had to completely stop nursing him because I just completely dried up. :-( I'm bummed about that, but happy my boy is getting fed.

His reflux is still going strong, unfortunately. So we'll just keep him on the Previcid until his 6 month appointment (which will be when he's 7 months, thanx to me not knowing I need to schedual his appointments 4 months in advance), then wean him off and see how he does.

Urijah did get 2 shots today - PC and HIB. He's a little grumpy so far but not bad, poor boy.

Fabulous (aka Mika's 18 month checkup)

So. Today was Mika's 18 month checkup.

Let me preface this by saying that we woke up today, immediately got dressed and hopped in the car by 9am so that we could drive down to Focus on the Family for an all MOPS playdate. We had a blast! We were having so much fun I dragged leaving for the appointment, so we ended up 5 minutes late.

At this point both kids are now asleep in the backseat. I sit for a second looking at them through the rearview mirror, and the kid's monkey mirrors, wishing I didn't have to wake them up. I notice that Urijah needs his snuzzler replaced with our strap bears for more support 'cause his head is at a very odd angle.

So I fix Urijah's head, get the carseat out (with him still sleeping) then wake Mika up and haul them, and the diaper bag, into the Dr's office. Urijah immediately wakes up. I put Mika down and she runs for the toys. I then deal with one $15 past-due co-pay, today's $15 co-pay, call Zarik for Mika's insurance member # (since he has her card because he picked up her prescription last week), give them Urijah's card to copy, write her card # down, and try to start filling out all the paperwork. Before I even get her name on it all, we are called back.

As soon as we get to the room, Urijah starts crying. The nurse kindly looks after him while I strip Mika for her weight and height. After that's all done I take Urijah out of his carseat and try to fill out the paperwork again. The Dr comes right in and starts talking while I finish up the stuff pertinent to the appointment.

Rundown:
Height - 31" (30%)
Weight - 23 lbs 1.5 oz (30%)
Head - 46.5 cm (48%)
Shots - DTaP
Speech - Dr was amazed she says more than one or two two-syllable words (said bubbles and backpack just today!)
Milk - Whole until 2 years old
Diaper Rash - Ahhhhh. Here is were things get interesting:

The terminology she used is that Mika is allergic to diapers. ALL TYPES OF DIAPERS. Cloth included.

Basically, she gets yeast rashes. Then because of the dark, damp, constantly-on, always-rubbing-against-her-bottom environment it turns scabby and stays that way. Basically, this is not fully going away until she's potty trained. We are trying an antifungal mixed with Desitin right now per the dermatologist, and the dr wants us to try plain vasaline and cortaid for a few days instead and see if that helps the scabbing now that the yeast is gone (for now).

PTHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

So, after all that I put Urijah in his carseat so I can get Mika dressed and hold her for her shot. He starts screaming. We're finally ready to go so we go to the waiting room to make our next appointment (2 years old) and so I can fill out the insurance paperwork. Urijah is screaming the whole time. I really hope they can read my handwriting.

And hear.

We finally get to the car and both kids immediately fall asleep.

Ah, Bliss.

Poor Baby Mika :(

Honestly, I was waiting to write about this because I was hoping we'd go to the Dr really fast, and I'd be able to give a great pro-active update. Unfortunately, that is not yet the case.

Since Mika was a year old she's been getting really bad diaper rashes. REALLY bad diaper rashes. The scabby, won't-go-away type. Fortunatly not the open-bleeding-sore type, but almost there. We've taken her to the pediatrition a couple of times for it, plus our pedi glanced at it at each of Urijah's appointments, and at Mika's 15 month appointment. We feel like we've tried just about everything - Aquaphore, Nystantin (a yeast med), Bacitracian (an antibacterial OTC med), a special compound of Aquaphore and a steroid, plus Courtaid 2x/day. We think that her last round of a rash was Staph (scary, I know! But the pedi says it's not as bad as it sounds) and that the Bacitracian helped it. She still had red spots, but we were told that they were probably scars from how bad the rash was.

Well, now here we are about three weeks later and she has ANOTHER rash. I know what started THIS one. A week and a half ago we gave her a LOT of bluberries. That really affected her pooping. (TMI, I know) I mean, it turned terquoise!!! And she immediately got a rash. We started immediate action with all of the things above, and.....nothing. It's still horrible! It will start to get better, then she'll poop again and it's back to really bad! She's definately in pain, too, poor baby.

So I called the pedi again, and she's reffering us to the dermatologist. Only problem is the pedi wants us in THIS WEEK and the dermatologist can't get us in until February 4th. So today after Mika started gasping in pain I called the dermatologist in tears begging them to find a cancellation or gap somewhere so my baby can be seen. The nurse was really sweet when she called back, and now we're hopefully going to get a call from another nurse tomorrow telling us they talked to a different Dr. and he can see us.

I just hope we have a good update soon!

Urijah's 2 month Dr Appointment

I've totally been slacking in posting this, since the appointment was Monday, and it's now Thursday, but such is my brain and my life. :)

The appointment went great! Our big guy is now 10lbs, 9oz (25%) and 22 3/4" long! That is 4lbs, 4oz and 2 3/4" bigger than when born. Way to go big guy! Besides a li'l diaper rash he looks completely healthy and happy. (The diaper rash is gone already, BTW. It was gone by Tuesday night.) He got 2 vaccines: the DTaP shot, and Rotovirus by mouth. He cried just for a second, then was all better. I talked to the pediatrition about him possibly having reflux (he spits up every time after he eats, and does a "spit up face" then "chews" and swallows it back down [gross!]). She agrees that he does have it, but for now we're just going to watch it and pray he grows out of it with none of the weirdness Mika had.

Speaking of Mika, the pediatrition saw her walking down the hall, and noticed that her feet go in when she walks. I had noticed it too, and was going to bring it up at her 18 month appointment next month, so I was glad the pediatrition noticed this time and mentioned it. She wanted us to make an appointment with the orthapedic to have it looked at, which works perfectly because we needed to make an appointment for when she is about 21 months to get another check up x-ray on her hips. So we're doing the whole shabang in 3 months (April) when she's 20 months.

Baby Feet, Mommy Feet

"I'm SO bored"

Urijah's 2 Week Doctor Appointment

So when we went for Urijah's newborn appointment, we saw a different pediatrition than our normal one because ours was sick that day. Everything looked good then, and he only lost 3lbs from his birth weight, but she said she wanted us to come back when he was 2 weeks old anyways. I'm glad we got to, though, so our pediatrition could look at him, too.

Breastfeeding is going VERY well and Urijah has already gained over a full pound over his "leaving the hospital" weight, which at 7lbs, 3.5oz is 14.5 oz over his birth weight! Go Tiny Man! She did a full exam on him since she hadn't seen him herself yet and said that everything looks great!! He lost most of his cord at 4 days old, and the last little piece a few days ago. Even though it's still oozing a tiny bit, she said it looks good.

Mika is doing very well with the transition to being a big sister. She has been a little more moody, but then again, she's a toddler now!

Mika's 15 Month Doctor Appointment

Monday we went for Mika's 15 month appointment. Our girl is getting so big!! She's 21lbs, 12.5oz (the 40th percentile), 30.5 inches long (50th percentile) and her head is 46cm around (46th percentile). Her "curve" on the growth chart is staying nice and consistant, except for her weight which is going up, and that's what we've wanted since she was 6 months old, so yeah!!

The pediatrition was VERY impressed by Mika's verbal skills. We guess-timated that she has about 35 words that she says, plus animal sounds. We were told that most kids only have a couple dozen at MOST and animal sounds are more like 18m-2y! She's a li'l talker!! Now if only we can get her to USE her words when she actually wants something.... ;-)

There really wasn't a whole lot we needed to talk with her about, so it was a pretty short appointment. It did end with the inevitable shots, though - HIB and flu. She did so great though! Cried just for a minutes while I frantically grabbed for her binky, then walked out of there like it was nothin'!

Pre-Labor

I am currently in a land called pre-labor. It's an encouraging, but not so nice place between Braxton-Hicks Contractions, and 2 minute apart/4 centemeter dialated active labor. Basically, I am having quite painful contractions every 20 minutes that I have to stop and breathe through, and wake me if I'm asleep.

I was contracting pretty regularly last night - every 10 minutes until about 4am, then because I hadn't eaten in a while they were at 2.5 minutes. I took a shower, ate (a protein bar and baked potato of all things - I think my body was telling me I should carbo-load, lol!!), had a gatorade and spent time timing them. I was about to tell Zarik we should put our hospital stuff in the car when they started spacing out again, so I went back to bed and they spaced back out to 20 min where they've been ever since. I had my chiropractor appointment and saw Sharon (my midwife) today, and they pretty much just said hang in there, you're getting so close! I just really hope I can last until active labor - these contractions HURT and are draining me. Zarik is making sure I stay hydrated and eat enough to keep my body functioning through this, though. He's the best! I think he just likes being able to put all our labor practice into play for the first REAL time, lol.

Please pray for me (for all of us) as, even though it is exciting, I am getting tired and a little frustrated, especially knowing it could be days of this. I really want to stay positive and optimistic, but it's not easy.

Mika's 1 year Dr. Appointment

We've been so busy this week I forgot to actually blog about her dr. appointment!!

We went in last Thursday (Aug 21st) for her 1 year old appointment. It was a couple of weeks late because of our Hawaii trip (darn, huh?). She is 19lbs, 10oz; 21.25" long, and her head is 45.75cm around. That is 25% in weight, 52% in height and 50% for head. All in all she looks great!! She has added a few percentiles in weight, which we really wanted to see, and is the same percentile-wise in height and head. Yeah!!

We now have switched her completely over to whole milk (organic, of course!) from her formula. We tried to switch cold-turkey, but she wouldn't have it! It took us about 3 days to fully wean her over, but that's not bad at all. She's also good to eat everything but nuts and shellfish because they are the most dangerous allergens if she is allergic. She doesn't have any teeth yet (bet we're in for it when she starts teething!) but we mash up pretty much everything for her to eat.

She did get one shot, but only cried for a second and then was fine. My brave girl!!

I'll get our Hawaii pics/story up as soon as I can. 'Till later!

Mika had a UGI test today

aka an Upper GI test. Basically she had to drink a few oz of "vanilla" flavored barium while they took a fluoroscope x-ray to see how it went through her GI system and if there were any anatomical abnormalities. Zarik got called to work yesterday, so he couldn't be there. The Dr and assistant were great though, when I told them I was 4 months pregnant. I got to stand behind a lead wall and watch though a window. They did have to turn off the x-ray and call me in to help get the last 1/2 oz in her, but besides that Mika did great!! And the best news is that everything looks great!! The Dr did see her reflux, but it's, for lack of a better word, "normal" - not caused by something bad. So she'll probably outgrow it in the next 3-15 months!! Even though this has seemed like a huge ordeal the last three months or so, I am so glad we now know what the gasping is, what causes it, and how to treat it (basically to watch her outgrow it). So here's a big "WHEW!" and a couple of recent cute pics!!

With the Meercats at the Zoo


Playing in her new splash pool

My baby's 9 months old!

Wednesday was Mika's 9 month birthday! Today we went to the pediatrition for her 9 month checkup. She's still pretty little, but gaining and growing which is awesome!! She's 15lb4oz (10th percentile), 27.5" long (50!th percentile) and her head is 50th percentile. The dr's not at all concerned about her weight, especially since she's had so many virus' the last 2 months (she got another one right before we left for California) and with the whole switching to formula less than 3 months ago. She's right on developmentally (almost crawling, babbling, starting to pull up, etc.). We talked about feedings and solids and we are pretty much going to start doing more "big people" food for her and not worry about baby food since she doesn't really like it. She gave us a lot of ideas for food, so I was glad about that. Mika's been sleeping horrible, but the pediatrician thinks it's 'cause of the virus' so to give it another week or so, then some tough love! The gaspy thing (trachio- or larangio-malacia) is still there so we're going to see a pediatric GI dr soon to see what he has to say about it. I'm also looking into a Naturopathic Physician, so we'll see what happens. Then she got a DTaP shot and didn't even cry! Barely even noticed! I think the puffs she was holding helped with that, lol. So all in all a great appointment!!

OH, and Mika is all better

The dr thinks that the virus' were all mutations of the same thing. The flu thing turned into the resperatory thing which tried to become a sinus infection, that went into an incubation period for 2 days, which then started draining and became a really bad sore/hoarse throat. *sigh* We've finally recovered, though. Now we're back to working on eating solids! Not Mika's favorite thing...

Dr. appointments galore! Mika Update...

So today we (Mika and I) had some Dr appointments.

Today was originally schedualed for a reflux/prevacid check. It turned into a sickness update/reflux check. The flu poor Mika had is turning into a resperatory thing (so a cold) and I guess it's fairly common for it to do that. The pedi thinks the coughing will culminate Sat/Sun, and there may be more vomiting associated with it because of all the draining mucus and the coughing. That should be lovely, as we'll be in Cali then for a funeral. I can start giving her half-strength formula again today. She just had 2 oz w/half a scoop and some pedialyte/white grape juice to chase it down.

As far as the reflux goes, because of the vomiting plateau (even when everything else was getting better she was vomiting) and the fact that she didn't do her gaspy thing until 4 days off the prevacid (she wasn't keeping it down, why bother giving it to her) We are pretty darn sure it's reflux. Basically, with any illness reflux is aggravated and that's probably why she plateaued. So we're on the prevacid until her 9m appt and then we'll re-evaluate her, probably take her off for a couple weeks to see how she is, and if she hasn't grown out of it we'll go to a GI dr. I'm also going to start giving her acidopholus (doing research on this now) to help heal her body/give her body a break so she has a better chance of growing out of this in a month and a couple of weeks.

The shirt says it all


Our little "almost" crawler!

Worse than a fever (some TMI)

Unfortunately, the fever was just the beginning. Saturday morning we woke up to Mika vomiting all over herself and the bed. Three times. And a diaper full of diarrhea. We were going to take her back to the Dr, and we were going to get there right before they closed, but we got a flat tire on the way. So I called and talked to a nurse while Zarik changed the tire. We started her on pedialyte, gave her small amounts of of bananas and rice cereal (the baby BRAT diet) and waited about 16 hours before trying formula again. She did OK until about 4 in the morning, then threw up again. Luckily her fever was gone by this point. We continued Sunday and Monday to do just pedialyte during the day with some solids, and try formula at night. She started refusing the pedialyte and continued to throw up the formula. Tuesday I called the Dr since I was concerned she was still throwing up and now refusing the pedialyte almost completely. We saw her at 1:30. Mika was on the low end of dehydration, so she told us to try plain pedialyte with white grape juice, or really watered down Gatorade if she wouldn't take that. So far she likes the Gatorade. We were going to have to go to the hospital for IV fluids if she didn't drink 6oz or have a wet diaper by 8pm. Well, no wet diaper, but she did drink, so the Dr told us we'd watch her overnight, and if there was vomiting or no wet diaper by morning, to call and we may have to go in. Her diaper was soaked, which was awesome. Unfortunately, she had a coughing fit after having about 1 1/2 oz of Gatorade at 6am and that made her throw up. The dr said just to continue to watch her since it was the coughing that caused it, and if the coughing gets worse and keeps causing her to vomit, we'd have to bring her back in. Right now Mika is taking a nap and Zarik and I are trying to rest. It's been a loooooong weekend.

Mika's first fever :(

So my poor li'l girl got her first fever today. She woke up a few times last night coughing, but I think that was just because silly Mommy forgot to fill up the humidifier - oops!! She was a little fussy at the beginning of Bible Study, which was weird, then while I was talking for a few minutes, one of the gals held Mika and when she gave her back, said Mika felt hot. Now, Mika is a hot baby, period. She and Zarik (whom she gets her hot-bloodedness from) can't cuddle for more than a few minutes before they are both overheated and sweating bullets. But I noticed her eyes looked a little glassier than normal, too. So I took her temp when we got home, and sure 'nough, it was 102.3!!! So a call was made to the dr, who wanted to see her. So I drove 50 minutes to the north office (we normally go to the south office, but they were closed for the day) only to have her fever down to 99.7. Everything else looked good, so the dr gave me some things to watch out for, how to treat it, etc. Really, nothing The Baby Book by Dr Sears didn't already tell me. Then it was 45 minutes back home. *sigh*

Oh, and after checking in, I had to hand Mika to the receptionist and go toss my cookies. Gotta love morning - I mean all day - sickness. *double sigh*

Long Time,No Update

Mika had a dr appointment yesterday, mainly for a "weight check" since she had lost weight at her 6 month appointment. Her weight was awesome! 14lbs, .5oz!!! So she gained 2lbs, 4.5oz in a month on formula! Yeah! We can definitely see and feel a difference in her.

She has still been doing the gaspy thing, which, at the dr's request, I took a couple of videos of and brought in with us. The dr. told us that the chest x-rays we had taken were clear, so that is good news. She again quizzed me on how much she spits up, etc. The one thing I had noticed the last few weeks is sometimes she acts like she's spitting up, but swallows it back. So again, we are back to thinking this whole thing is caused by reflux. We are trying Mika on Previcid for 2 weeks, then going back in for a followup appointment. Basically, if the previcid cures the gaspy thing, we are pretty darn sure it's reflux and will go see a GI dr at that point to figure out how bad it is.

Otherwise, Mika is doing awesome!! She found her tongue this week, and is using it to make a LOT more sounds and combinations of sounds which is so cute! She is a really happy baby and now that she's slowing her growth spurt down she's back to sleeping about 9-10 hours a night, and we think she'll start weaning back further, so that'll be good!

As for me and our newest little one, we are doing great! Morning sickness found me last week, but I was expecting it. It's not that bad yet, but I'm not gonna jinx myself and think this is how it'll be the whole time! I go in for my next appointment the same day as Mika's followup, March 27, and I am hoping for an ultrasound so we can see a heartbeat! I am currently 7 weeks along (as of tomorrow!).

On a side note, it's snowing here. We already have about 8-10 inches and it's not slowing down! Zarik barely made it into work today, and we have no idea if we're going to get to go to the Hockey game we were planning on going to tonight. :( But yeah for snow!! I love it as long as I'm cozy inside! ;)

This picture was taken at a playdate at Focus on the Family. Mika's "playing" with her "friend" Ellie.

The story of Mika's hips

I realised that if you're reading my updates on here about Mika's hips, you probably have no idea what I'm talking about, since that is before I started blogging. So here is the story of Mika's hips:

On the day she was born she had a pediatrician come look at her, as is custom. He felt like her left hip was a little loose and ordered an ultrasound of her hips. The next morning she got the ultrasound and sure enough, it looked like hip displacia, so we got a referral to an pediatric orthopedic. Two weeks later, on August 20th, we had her first appointment. They looked over her ultrasound and decided to put her in this lovely thing called a pavlic.



Loads of fun, right? We had to go in once a week to get it adjusted for her growth. We had another ultrasound on her hips September 11th. We were fortunate to have a nice technician who said she would read the ultrasound and get it to our Dr for our 1pm appointment. (It normally takes about 4 days) Unfortunately, there wasn't much improvement, so she had to stay in it.

We had our third hip ultrasound on October 15th, and again they were gracious enough to read and get the results to our orthopedic by 1pm. There was only a 2% increase in the previous month. The orthopedic REALLY didn't like that, and as the next month went on got more and more concerned. She feels how her hips feel in the sockets every week, so she gets an idea of how they may be progressing, and she didn't think they were progressing very well. She told us that if the next ultrasound didn't show much improvement we'd have to probably do a body cast that held the legs in the right position. We started praying REALLY hard and asked everyone else to, too, at that!!!

Our fourth ultrasound was on November 13th. God totally preformed a miracle and her hips and about an 11% increase!!! We were so thrilled!! This meant she got to be out of the brace during the day. Now we'd only had to go down to part-time, meaning 12 hours a day. The orthopedic recommended at night and during naps, but gave us leniency to decide. We decided that since she slept 10 hours a night, we'd just do that. We didn't want to mess with putting her in and out of it during the day.

So for the next month we adjusted the pavlic ourselves and she was only in it at night!! By December 11th, she was out of it for good!!

A deviation RE Mika's hips....

Greetings from Cali!! We are here visiting for the weekend (just Mika and I). On our way out of town we had an appointment with Mika's pediatric orthopedic. She had a quick x-ray that they developed and showed us. Basically they want "the angles" (not quite sure what exactly they are talking about there) to be below 30% by the time she's a year old. One is at 31% and the other is at 29%!! That is awesome! Dr. Seagle also showed me where her hips bones/socket are becoming bone now and aren't just cartalidge. That is very good! So we go back for another x-ray at 1 year to check to make sure it's still all good. Whew! One less thing to worry about!

Here's a picture for the heck of it! :D

Lactation Consultant

We saw a lactation consultant today. We told her what's been going on with Mika and me, and then she watched me nurse Mika. She saw how Mika gets her letdown quickly and gulps it down. After only two min on the boob she said to take her off, that her sucking had changed. She asked if we were oppossed to supplementing and then gave Mika a 2oz bottle. She sucked it down so fast! After a few min of talking to us, she was looking at Mika and said, lets try another. Mika sucked that one down too!! The LC was shocked!! So while I work on my milk supply I'm to supplement her with up to 4oz after bfing. Then I pump to help me while Mika NOW happily plays. I'm starting fenugreek, upping my calorie intake and turning some of water to juices and gatorade (she said I was probably drinking too much water!). She gave us a much more realistic solids schedual for Mika.

And, she doesn't think Mika has silent reflux, or if she does it's really mild. She said the kid is just HUNGRY!!! That's such a mixed blessing, lol. On one hand, I am soooooooo releaved there's probably not anything serious wrong with her, on the other, I FEEL INCREDABLY GUILTY! I was starving my baby! She's going to talk to our pedi and wants to hold off on all the tests we were going to get done starting next mon. I'm glad we hadn't started the previcid yet. So now I'm just waiting on a call from either her or the pedi to confirm we're delaying the tests, and starting this new plan.

Update on Us

Well, the Reglan didn't go over so well with me. Unfortunately I found out it's a depressive, which is not good for someone with a type of ADD that closely mirrors depression and anxiety. So I stopped that and it took a couple of days to get out of my system, but I am doing very well now. I am seeing a lactation consultant Wednesday morning and am starting Feungreek which is an herb that can help with milk production.

As for Mika, we have been pumping her full of solids. Unfortunately this has made her a very cranky li'l girl. She is suddenly not sleeping through the night. She also cries in between bites of food. I called the pediatrition this morning and told her about these recent developments. She is really sure now that it is Silent Reflux. That explains everything, including the gasping. We are keeping the Upper GI test appointment next Monday, and I can't remember exactly what she said, but I'm pretty sure we are also going to have to admit Mika to the hospital overnight and do another test that involves sticking a tube down her throat. I'm going to ask her more questions about that when she calls me Tuesday. She also wanted to put Mika on Prilosec, but the pharmacy didn't have the correct dosage, so they're having to call the pediatrition tomorrow to see what she wants to do. The reason she's wanting to do the medication before the test is that because of her gaspy thing, her biggest worry is that Mika may choke and apirate.

Please pray for us. I know this is not the end of the world or anything, but it's not easy to go through either.

Mika's 6 month appointment

The concerns I went in with were 1) Her weird gaspy episodes, 2)Her weight (I had mommy intuition that she had either platued or lost some) and 3)I want her on an alternative shot schedual because of some reactions after her last shots.

Now, this is a new dr for us. We were using a FD and while I think she's great, she really wasn't cutting it with Mika. She kept telling us to go to the ER for the gaspy thing and not following up.

As far as the shots went, the new pedi was totally fine with it!! She said a lot of her patients do an alternative schedual, so yeah!!!

She was so incredably great at listening to our concerns, asking good questions, and making a pro active plan. So here's the deal:

Mika has lost weight. She was 11lb13oz at 4m. She was 12lb4oz at 5 m(sick baby visit). Today she was 11lb12.5oz. *sigh* She really doesn't want to come right out and supplement with formula with out doing a month of good milk-supply-upping stuff, which I am sooooo glad for!! That's what I wanted and what she suggrested! So I am now on Reglan 3x/day, and am under orders to up the Mother's Milk Tea and drink TONS of water. (I'm already drinking 3-4 liters a day!) She also wants me to start pumping before feeding, see what I get, nurse Mika to see if she gets some hindmilk, then give her what I pumped. We are also to totally bump up her solids. We just started this week, but had only been doing like 1oz 1-2x/day. We are now to do cereal w/1 vegi or fruit (whole or at least half of the jar) after first and before last feedings of the day, 1 jar each of a fruit and vegi for "lunch", and a snack of puffs or a biscit in the afternoon.

Also, we go in a week from mon to have a chest x-ray and upper GI test to see if what is causing the gaspy thingy. She gave us two possibilites at this point: Silent Reflux (would have to be REALLY silent as Mika is NOT a fussy baby in any sense of the word) or Tracheomalacia, and I quote from the internet "a process characterized by flaccidity of the supporting tracheal cartilage, widening of the posterior membranous wall, and reduced anterior-posterior airway caliber. These factors cause tracheal collapse, especially during times of increased airflow such as coughing, crying, or feeding." We will discuss more what we will do with either of these when we figure out what it is. She said something like if it is Tracheomalacia she may just need to grow out of it. Then we will work on the feeding/weight issues completely separately.

I gotta say, although I am VERY happy we are being proactive in all this, I am so bummed we have to be. This isn't going to be easy.

Thanks if you made it this far.

PS She was 25" (25%) w/a head circ. of 42.5cm(45%!) So other than her weight, she's growing great!