A Mompreneur’s Chronicle Of Life With Her Boys

Swallow Study

Sep 09 2009

Yesterday was William’s swallow study. This was the last of the tests GI suggested we do with him. During the swallow study he sat in a seat that looked similar to a car seat next to a fluoroscope (like the one used during the upper GI). We fed him bottles of barium and then watched how he swallowed the liquid. For him we tried thin (normal formula consistency) and thickened (slightly thicker than we use) liquid. They were looking to make sure that he doesn’t aspirate (let the liquid go into his lungs) when he swallows. We switched back and forth with the two thicknesses during the test.

We found that he was almost aspirating the thin liquid (normal formula consistency). He was letting it go into his windpipe and only his vocal cords were closing down and pushing it out. Not good. With the thickened liquid he did much better. He was able to control is swallow and move it down his esophagus smoothly, not letting it in his wind pipe. He needs to be on the thickened formula for at least the next several months; then we will retest him and see if he has gotten better.

Even though this isn’t the original reason that we put him on the thickened formula (reflux was), it is good that he is on it and likes it. It also explains why I have noticed that he eats smoother and faster. It is easier for him to control and move through his swallow mechanism. I am not sure what it means for him learning to eat solids. That is a question for our feeding specialist, Robin Glass.

The most interesting thing to me was that this was the test that I thought the least about and figured wasn’t going to show much. I even thought about canceling it. (I also thought that about his eye appointment.) I guess I need to stop thinking that.

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Follow-up GI appointment

Sep 05 2009

Yesterday Will had his GI follow-up appointment with Dr. Burpee at Seattle Children’s. The test results for the pH probe, Upper GI and Endoscopy were all normal. He had 31 episodes of reflux detected by the pH probe during the 24 hour period. One of them lasted a minute, but none longer than that. His Upper GI should normal anatomy, with no twists or other issues. The biopsies from the Endoscopy were all normal, except one in his stomach which showed minor irritation. Dr. Burpee said that about 40% of the time they get one of those results and it was nothing to worry about.

 Since we started thickening Will’s formula he has been eating better. He is still not back up where he was, but now he is eating around 24 oz per day. He is much happier during the feedings and eats smoother usually. (Fingers crossed I am not jinxing anything by actually writing this down). We are trying a few solids too, but so far he is slow to take to it.

Dr. Burpee wanted us to decrease his medicines, but we aren’t ready for that yet. Things are leveling out for us after our eventful summer and it is nice to have things working again. We agreed that when we were comfortable that we would first stop the Zantac and then later decrease the Prevacid. We are going to go see him again in 3 months. He is a very nice doctor and reasonable about us not wanting to monkey with anything right now.

So fingers crossed we keep his feedings going fine and can working on introducing some solids in the next month or so. I can’t wait to see blueberries all over those cheeks.

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Photos of Will

Sep 02 2009

Today I finally got some photos hung of William in the house. I know he is 5.5 months old, but we have had a few things going on. I was starting to feel pretty guilty since we have photos of Jack EVERYWHERE. (why not, he is a cute kid) We even have more photos up of the dog than Will. If you have ever been to our house you know that our walls are decorated with mostly photos.

I love photos. The tell such amazing stories about your life, like the trips you have taken, family members born, ones who aren’t here anymore, weddings and everyday life. I walk by the photos all day long, but I still stop and look at them remembering the great days or people pictured. I have moved our digital picture frame into the kitchen now that we have rearranged the furniture again (yes, there are photos of Will on that at least). Jack loves to stand by it and watch them cycle through. He is in most of them, so it is fun for him to tell the story of his life.

As for Will, I guess it must be a 2nd child thing that your photos don’t get displayed until you are almost 6 months old. Being a 1st child I wouldn’t know what that is like (sorry Steff.) I hope that I do better about some of the typical things 2nd children miss, like completing his baby book, taking video of all the fun things he does, saving his school papers and displaying his artwork, since all of it will be cherished items in our house. I do have some room for improvement on the baby book. Jack’s wasn’t completed until he was almost 2.5 years old. I got a lot of grief about that from my friend Sarah.

Anyway, Will is now displayed in our house and I look forward to adding to his collection of photos.

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A mother’s intuition

Sep 01 2009

How is it that mothers just know that something is going to happen, good or bad. Is it something that happens with all the hormones from pregnancy? I have always found it interesting that moms can see a situation and think (or say out loud) that something might happen. Then sure enough a few seconds or minutes later it does.

I had that experience today. We were at Beaver Lake Park for a picnic and walk with some of our mom’s group friends (Will’s group, so Jack was the only big kid) and I had decided to bring Mulligan with us for Jack to play with. As I got settled at the picnic table and spread out our lunch, Jack and Mulligan were roaming around checking things out. For those that haven’t been there it is a beautiful Northwest park with woods, trails and a lake. I was chatting with one of the other moms and looked toward Jack and Mulligan who had walked down near the lake. I thought I should go tell Jack to not let Mulligan in the water.

Not 30 seconds later there was a scream and crying. I knew immediately that Mulligan had pulled Jack into the water probably trying to get some sort of critter. As I ran down to the water all I could think was, of course I don’t have a change of clothes for him. I found him standing in water up to his mid-calf crying as Mulligan happily was swimming around trying to get the ducks. He was so upset that he had gotten wet, especially his shoes. He didn’t want to so home, but he wanted me to run home and get him some clean clothes and shoes. We ended up staying to have lunch, which he ate wrapped in a blanket, with just his underwear on.

So we all learned some valuable lessons today…

Me – never leave the house without a change of clothes for everyone in the car.

Jack – let go of the leash, instead of letting Mulligan pull you into the water.

Mulligan – mom gets really mad when you pull your brother into the lake.

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