I don't want to repeat this 50 times so I will just say it here. Thor is recovering from the rotovirus. He hasn't thrown up since Sunday, although he still has horrific smelling rotovirus diarrhea. But even that is slowing down. Thor has enjoyed hanging out at home with John the past few days. He is not enjoying his new food regimine.
We are going through one can of the new formula every 3 days and at $50 bucks per can, we need a new plan. (Contrary to popular belief, lawyers are not made of money.) So we are offering him baby food morning, noon, and night. He doesn't like it. He screams. But we manage to get 2-3 bites in each time. Hopefully, he will decide he likes it. We are also mixing cereal in his bottle with his formula--something I SWORE I would never do for a child--to 1) get him used to the texture and 2) hope he starts to like the taste and will eat it off a spoon. I also have a very sweet friend whose baby has the same formula and she shares with me. :-) Thanks, Robin! And my secret weapon . . . .EBAY!
Yep, I am bidding on cases of the formula on eBay. It's harder than you would think. There are some people that sit on there night and day and monopolize all of the ElaCare formula. But, I have managed to snag a few cases for less than half what I could buy it in the stores for. Now normally, I would not buy something as important and sensitive as baby food online. But a coworker whose baby had the same problem told me that's what she did to afford it and never had any problems. All the cans (and cases) are sealed and sellers aren't allowed to sell expired formula on eBay--the sellers have to post the date it expires and most of them take a picture of the expiration date to prove it. And desperate times call for desperate measures. (I mean really, FIFTY DOLLARS??) So a 6-can case of ElaCare would cost $300 (plus tax) retail. I just scored a case for $98.55 no tax, shipping included. Not necessarily a "bargain" considering it is still $16.43 for a small, 14 oz. can, but super-duper better than I could buy it elsewhere.
It seemed like a good idea at the time, but if I could have a do-over, I would not have stopped breast feeding!
Anyway, Thor is now used to the new formula--after many tearful hours trying to hold out on us. We will go see the pediatric GI doctor in a couple weeks and see how Thor is doing. He's finally starting to look like normal again, although thinner. And today, he is a whopping 9 months old!
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Monday, February 27, 2012
Thor's First Hospital Visit
First, let me thank all of you for your prayers and support while Thor was in the hospital. You all bless my family in so many ways.
Thor has been throwing up and having diarrhea for 2 months now. It was so bad Wednesday that he couldn't keep anything down at all and the poop smell was just awful! He was vomitting til he was dry heaving. On Thursday, our pediatrician sent him straight to the children's hospital--bypassed the ER--where they had a bed waiting for him. He was severly dehydrated. It was good that we didn't wait any longer. His liver enzymers were 5 times what they should have been.
He tested positive for the rotovirus. He had all his vaccinations for it, but this must have been a strain other than type A (the one that causes 90% of infections and that the vaccine is supposed to prevent). The pediatric gastroentologist thinks he also has a milk protein sensitivity.
Because it's a virus, there is no cure. He was on IV fluids only for 2 days so he wouldn't become deydrated again. Getting the IV in was horribly upsetting for everyone involved. Becuase he was so dehydrated his veins were hard to hit. Add to that his chubby little arms and legs and it took 3 nurses and 40 minutes of trying on both arms to finally get a vein. He screamed lilke we were killing him, and I bet he felt like we were. It was terrible! Then they had to draw blood every day for more tests-uggh!
Before the IV, just feeling crappy:
He loved chewing on the IV.
Up close look:
By Saturday we were able to start him on his new (very expensive!) formula. He tolerated it fairly well. By late Saturday night he was on the mend, keeping his food down and only 3 bouts of diarrhea. They couldn't do anything more for him so they released him. He is still sick, but feeling better than before. He may still have vomitting and diarrhea for 1-2 weeks, but hopefully not as bad, or else he will be back in the hospital.
He will have a follow-up with the GI doc after the virus is done to see if he really does have an allergy. Then we can hopefully get this under control!
Thor has been throwing up and having diarrhea for 2 months now. It was so bad Wednesday that he couldn't keep anything down at all and the poop smell was just awful! He was vomitting til he was dry heaving. On Thursday, our pediatrician sent him straight to the children's hospital--bypassed the ER--where they had a bed waiting for him. He was severly dehydrated. It was good that we didn't wait any longer. His liver enzymers were 5 times what they should have been.
He tested positive for the rotovirus. He had all his vaccinations for it, but this must have been a strain other than type A (the one that causes 90% of infections and that the vaccine is supposed to prevent). The pediatric gastroentologist thinks he also has a milk protein sensitivity.
Because it's a virus, there is no cure. He was on IV fluids only for 2 days so he wouldn't become deydrated again. Getting the IV in was horribly upsetting for everyone involved. Becuase he was so dehydrated his veins were hard to hit. Add to that his chubby little arms and legs and it took 3 nurses and 40 minutes of trying on both arms to finally get a vein. He screamed lilke we were killing him, and I bet he felt like we were. It was terrible! Then they had to draw blood every day for more tests-uggh!
Before the IV, just feeling crappy:
By Saturday we were able to start him on his new (very expensive!) formula. He tolerated it fairly well. By late Saturday night he was on the mend, keeping his food down and only 3 bouts of diarrhea. They couldn't do anything more for him so they released him. He is still sick, but feeling better than before. He may still have vomitting and diarrhea for 1-2 weeks, but hopefully not as bad, or else he will be back in the hospital.
He will have a follow-up with the GI doc after the virus is done to see if he really does have an allergy. Then we can hopefully get this under control!
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Thor Loves Japanese Food
So remember the post about how much Thor hates food? Apparently, he only hates baby food, juice, and fruit. We went out to eat sushi Friday night and Thor munched on edamame:
He thought the pods were awesome! When they brought my miso soup, he wanted to try it. I could not shovel it in fast enough!! He was screaming his head off while I tried to blow on it so it wouldn't burn him. Thor just sucked it off the spoon like a pro. He was munching on pieces of rice I fed him off chopsticks. (And sucking on the lemon from my water.) I couldn't believe that he actually wanted to eat. I gave him a little taste of my tuna and he thought it was really good stuff.
So the next day I tried feeding him baby food thinking maybe he was ready to eat. Nada. He hated it. He wanted nothing to do with it. He just wants Japanese food. I think it's totally funny that both of my children love eating sushi.
He thought the pods were awesome! When they brought my miso soup, he wanted to try it. I could not shovel it in fast enough!! He was screaming his head off while I tried to blow on it so it wouldn't burn him. Thor just sucked it off the spoon like a pro. He was munching on pieces of rice I fed him off chopsticks. (And sucking on the lemon from my water.) I couldn't believe that he actually wanted to eat. I gave him a little taste of my tuna and he thought it was really good stuff.
So the next day I tried feeding him baby food thinking maybe he was ready to eat. Nada. He hated it. He wanted nothing to do with it. He just wants Japanese food. I think it's totally funny that both of my children love eating sushi.
RIP Zoey
Thor is just learning to walk--pulling himself up on everything and falling everywhere. We were afraid that he would try to crawl on her or fall on her and she would snap at him because it hurt her. So we decided it was time. She had bought herself an extra year.
Gary and Sabre took her. Sabre said Zoey was shaking all over and was so worked up that the shot they gave her to go to sleep before giving her the shot that would stop her heart couldn't knock her out--it took longer than usual. Sabre got a paw print to remind her of Zoey.
Zoey was a good dog. She barked only at strangers and was too smart for her own good. She kept Max in line. Max kind of walks around the house lost now. He hasn't eaten since she left--which for Max is really saying something. We all miss her.
Monday, February 6, 2012
Eight Months
Just so I don't forget what Thor can do at 8 months:
*Thor is crawling all over the place. Last weekend he was scooting around backwards--he hadn't quite figured out how to crawl forward. Then sometimes this week he got the hang of it. This weekend he was all over the place--hard wood floors facilitate fast crawling and boy, is he fast! This kid is never slow.
*He has his first 2 teeth, the bottom front. They popped through about January 25. And they get sharper every day. Yesterday he tried sharpening them on the beautiful end table that Grandma Vilda gave me!
*He still wakes up 2 times a night: once at 1-2am and another time at 4-5am. He used to sleep really well until he got sick and he's never managed to stay asleep very long after that--his nose is too stuffed up.
*Thor is babbling a lot. Sometimes he says "dadadadada" but I don't think he knows it's a word yet. He will say "mama" but only when he cries. I can't tell if that's just the sound he likes to make when he cries or if he realizes I'll come faster if he says my name. It is really cute when he gives me a baby-monkey-hug, thumps his head on my chest and cries "ma ma ma ma!" Other than that, he's said random words, but not consistently.
*Thor can now stand up in his crib and jump and yell for us. Gary found him standing yesterday morning. He is so proud of himself for learning how to pull up.
*And speaking of pulling up, Thor pulls up on everything now. He can pull up and scoot along furniture and then drop down and crawl after what he wants. He's tried to walk on his own (he thinks he can and only remembers that he can't when he biffs it). He has many little bumps and bruises on his arms and head from falling. He is still genuinely surprised when he falls down. He looks up like "I could do this yesterday, I swear! what happened?!"
*Thor holds his breath underwater. He has only blown bubbles once or twice (probably by accident). He never cried doing a back float until yesterday. Jenn showed me how to hold his head so he can't flip his feet up in the air or he sinks and he doesn't like that. He can cling to the side of the pool and can shift his weight to one hand to push over a toy on the ledge. He can scoot his little hands along the side of the wall and he's trying to crawl out--that will take a while because it's a lot of coordination. Occassionally, he will fall in from the edge on the count of 3, but most times we still have to nudge him. He loves being in the water. He laughs and splashes and kicks. He pushes away from us holding him like he thinks he can swim on his own.
And those are the major milestones we've reached so far. We sure love Thor!
*Thor is crawling all over the place. Last weekend he was scooting around backwards--he hadn't quite figured out how to crawl forward. Then sometimes this week he got the hang of it. This weekend he was all over the place--hard wood floors facilitate fast crawling and boy, is he fast! This kid is never slow.
*He has his first 2 teeth, the bottom front. They popped through about January 25. And they get sharper every day. Yesterday he tried sharpening them on the beautiful end table that Grandma Vilda gave me!
*He still wakes up 2 times a night: once at 1-2am and another time at 4-5am. He used to sleep really well until he got sick and he's never managed to stay asleep very long after that--his nose is too stuffed up.
*Thor is babbling a lot. Sometimes he says "dadadadada" but I don't think he knows it's a word yet. He will say "mama" but only when he cries. I can't tell if that's just the sound he likes to make when he cries or if he realizes I'll come faster if he says my name. It is really cute when he gives me a baby-monkey-hug, thumps his head on my chest and cries "ma ma ma ma!" Other than that, he's said random words, but not consistently.
*Thor can now stand up in his crib and jump and yell for us. Gary found him standing yesterday morning. He is so proud of himself for learning how to pull up.
*And speaking of pulling up, Thor pulls up on everything now. He can pull up and scoot along furniture and then drop down and crawl after what he wants. He's tried to walk on his own (he thinks he can and only remembers that he can't when he biffs it). He has many little bumps and bruises on his arms and head from falling. He is still genuinely surprised when he falls down. He looks up like "I could do this yesterday, I swear! what happened?!"
*Thor holds his breath underwater. He has only blown bubbles once or twice (probably by accident). He never cried doing a back float until yesterday. Jenn showed me how to hold his head so he can't flip his feet up in the air or he sinks and he doesn't like that. He can cling to the side of the pool and can shift his weight to one hand to push over a toy on the ledge. He can scoot his little hands along the side of the wall and he's trying to crawl out--that will take a while because it's a lot of coordination. Occassionally, he will fall in from the edge on the count of 3, but most times we still have to nudge him. He loves being in the water. He laughs and splashes and kicks. He pushes away from us holding him like he thinks he can swim on his own.
And those are the major milestones we've reached so far. We sure love Thor!
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Thor Hates Food
While we were at the zoo, we let Thor play on the tiny tot playground. He pulled himself up on a little weeble wobble farmer. He liked banging on the hat.
Then he started playing with the sand on the brim. Thor thought it would be a good idea to taste his hands after playing with the sand, not realizing the foreign object was on his fingers.
AHHHHHHH! Someone's trying to poison me!!!
Now, you may think he is only crying his heart out because its sand, and ewwww who likes to eat sand? But you would be wrong! No, no, he is crying because there is something other than milk in his mouth and no matter how much he spits, he can't get it out. Thor has decided not to eat any real food. Just milk.
He has never been a big fan of cereal or baby food, although we have still been trying to get him to eat it. But he used to like chewing on soy bean pods, celery, lemons, pickles, crackers, etc. Now, he won't put them anywhere near his mouth. I can give him a Gerber cookie that he used to like to gum up and he just bangs it on his high chair tray while I prepare and eat breakfast. And he turns up his nose at eggs, too. He won't even chew on food in his mesh feeder.
And try to give him baby food--holy cow! His lips are sealed tighter than if he was underwater! He's even learned that when he cries we take advantage of the moment to stuff food inside. So now he just grunts his disapproval through clamped jaws. If by some miracle, I manage to get food past his lips, he promptly spits it as far as he can.
Now he's learned to throw up on command. I have to get this on video because no one is going to believe that an 8 month old can throw up literally at will. It is crazy!!! This morning I scraped the smallest bit of a banana with a spoon to put on his tongue (hoping he would think it was the best thing he ever tasted). It was about the size of a piece of rice. I put it on his tongue (ok I held it to his lips until it was smeared on them and he made the mistake of licking his lips when I took the spoon away). He made 2 gagging sounds (I could see the banana on the tip of his tongue, so he wasn't choking on it) and he vomited his milk he ate 30 minutes before all over his tray.
Now normally, I wouldn't care. He's drinking formula so no biggie of he doesn't like anything else--he's getting nutrition. But he's constipated. So he needs juice or fruit to unclog his poor little intestines. And he refuses to drink juice--prune juice, apple juice, blueberry juice, grape juice, cranberry juice--he hates it all. We've tried it in a bottle, a cup, off a spoon and a medicine dropper. We tried mixing it with cereal or his formula. Nothing works. He can sniff out juice like a hound dog!
But one of the secretaries at work that raised 3 boys told me to give him a teaspoon of molasses in his formula until he poops. I didn't think he would drink the formula with it in there, but he did. And it worked! Gary and I felt so bad for the little guy!! He cried and cried when he pushed out a huge (for a baby) log of poop!! Ouch!! He still won't eat anything but formula, but I'm going to remember the molasses trick.
He has never been a big fan of cereal or baby food, although we have still been trying to get him to eat it. But he used to like chewing on soy bean pods, celery, lemons, pickles, crackers, etc. Now, he won't put them anywhere near his mouth. I can give him a Gerber cookie that he used to like to gum up and he just bangs it on his high chair tray while I prepare and eat breakfast. And he turns up his nose at eggs, too. He won't even chew on food in his mesh feeder.
And try to give him baby food--holy cow! His lips are sealed tighter than if he was underwater! He's even learned that when he cries we take advantage of the moment to stuff food inside. So now he just grunts his disapproval through clamped jaws. If by some miracle, I manage to get food past his lips, he promptly spits it as far as he can.
Now he's learned to throw up on command. I have to get this on video because no one is going to believe that an 8 month old can throw up literally at will. It is crazy!!! This morning I scraped the smallest bit of a banana with a spoon to put on his tongue (hoping he would think it was the best thing he ever tasted). It was about the size of a piece of rice. I put it on his tongue (ok I held it to his lips until it was smeared on them and he made the mistake of licking his lips when I took the spoon away). He made 2 gagging sounds (I could see the banana on the tip of his tongue, so he wasn't choking on it) and he vomited his milk he ate 30 minutes before all over his tray.
Now normally, I wouldn't care. He's drinking formula so no biggie of he doesn't like anything else--he's getting nutrition. But he's constipated. So he needs juice or fruit to unclog his poor little intestines. And he refuses to drink juice--prune juice, apple juice, blueberry juice, grape juice, cranberry juice--he hates it all. We've tried it in a bottle, a cup, off a spoon and a medicine dropper. We tried mixing it with cereal or his formula. Nothing works. He can sniff out juice like a hound dog!
But one of the secretaries at work that raised 3 boys told me to give him a teaspoon of molasses in his formula until he poops. I didn't think he would drink the formula with it in there, but he did. And it worked! Gary and I felt so bad for the little guy!! He cried and cried when he pushed out a huge (for a baby) log of poop!! Ouch!! He still won't eat anything but formula, but I'm going to remember the molasses trick.
Thor's First Zoo Experience
It has been the most mild winter that I can remember in Phoenix. It's usually pretty mild anyway, but this is ridiculous! The high has been around 75 degrees for over a month! So Gary, Thor and I took advantage of it and went to the Phoenix Zoo (along with half the metro area) yesterday. Here are Gary and Thor at the entrance:
I made sure that Thor wore is sunblock and a hat if he wasn't in the covered stroller so he wouldn't be sunburned. Yep, it was February 4 and he would have gotten sunburned.
We fed the ducks to get them to come up to Thor. He was fascinated.
Thor couldn't figure out what we were pointing at in most of the cages. Unless the animal was moving and was pretty large, he wasn't very interested if it was behind bars or glass. So we took some cute posed photos.
This reminds me of Max, king of the wild things
He is my pearl!!!
We went to the children's petting zoo. Thor was ok most of the time with the goats, but then one tried to chew on his coat and he freaked out.
It was such a gorgeous day to walk around the beautiful Phoenix Zoo. Thor loved just hanging out in his stroller. It was nice to get some exercise. We let Thor play in the playground--more on that in the next post. We bought a membership so we will definitely go back. Sabre used to love going to the zoo when she was little. They have so many things to do there other than looking at the animals now. I hope to see more of this cute smile there:
We fed the ducks to get them to come up to Thor. He was fascinated.
We went to the children's petting zoo. Thor was ok most of the time with the goats, but then one tried to chew on his coat and he freaked out.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)