This Ought to Do It...

I think after this post, we'll be officially caught up. I never thought I'd get to this point. Madeline had her two month (yes, 2 month) appointment today and because of the vaccines wanted to be held most of the day. I picked up the laptop and decided to buckle down and post on here. Here we go...

Now that Maddie is home, life has returned to normal, or at least a "new" normal. Until the end of April, we really can't take Madeline anywhere except the doctor. She's not allowed to be around children (except Isabella) and she continues to struggle with Acid Reflux and Colitis. Either David, our night care nurse, or I have to be with her at all times. This means David and I have to alternate taking Isabella places. We've managed to make it work, fortunately. Last weekend for Purim, I was able to take Isabella to her school celebration on Friday morning, David took her Friday night and Saturday night, and I took her to the synagogue carnival on Sunday. She LOVED dressing up. As you all know, she has quite the vivid imagination and being able to actually leave the house in her princess dresses thrilled her beyond words.

Here is Isabella at her many Purim celebrations:



Madeline has had quite the first couple of months. Right before she was discharged from the NICU, she was diagnosed with Acid Reflux and put on Prevacid. To help her gain weight, we were instructed to add a supplement (NeoSure - a "preemie" formula). We were told by the nurses she was a perfect baby - slept, never cried, and went a full 4 hours between feedings. Either they were full of s*%t or coming home through her for a major loop. I should mention feeding her is quite the ordeal. Because of her premature suck/swallow patterns, we have to feed her on her side when bottle feeding (same position as when she breastfeeds). This allows us to pace her and for her to learn to pace herself. Unfortunately, we have quite a few "choking" episodes. Part of this though, is due to her reflux. It's so severe that she starts to reflux within seconds of eating and it comes up so high it often times reaches her sinuses. This makes it hard for her to swallow without choking. Her reflux had gotten so bad we were going to the doctor twice a week. They suspected she might be lactose intolerant and advised us to take her off of the NeoSure which is milk-based and I was put on a strict no-dairy diet. They discovered blood in her stool and suggested the colitis might be a result of a milk-protein allergy so I had to eliminate breastfeeding altogether. They switched her to a soy-based formula (Nutramigen) and that made it even worse. She started have 20+ bowel movements/day which was causing her even more pain. She had to have an abdominal ultrasound to make sure everything was alright anatomically, which is was. After a week on the formula that made her poop like crazy, they switched her to an amino acid-based formula. She started to show improvements within the first 24 hours. However, we did have one incident with her spitting up blood, but fortunately it turned out to be from her sinuses (really minor). Because of the blood we did have to go immediately to pediatric gastroenterologist. If I say this was the worst doctor I've ever met, it wouldn't even BEGIN to describe how awful this man was. He seemed angry that I didn't know exactly what the strength was of her Prevacid. I told him her exact dose and where it was filled, but that didn't satisfy him. He even rolled his eyes at me when I asked a question. Long story short, he wanted to do an endoscopy and colonoscopy simultaneously the next morning. Not only did I tell him no, I just walked out of the office. I've never done that before, but you couldn't have paid me to let him put his hands on my Maddie. We are scheduled to see another pediatric gastroenterologist on April 21st, so I hoping for a completely different experience. (Just a side note: This whole time, miraculously she has consistently been putting on weight at a fantastic rate - imagine if she wasn't spitting up all the time...)

Last Monday (3/21) after checking for blood in her stool (they check every visit and every visit it's positive - the doc says it will probably be positive for 6-8 weeks from the first one (4 weeks ago)) they determined she'd made enough of an improvement (albeit very slight) that we could try slowly reintroducing breastfeeding last Thurs. (3/24). It's been 5 days and I must say, it's the best she's been since she was in the NICU. The doctor is very pleased with her growth, and as a bonus, there was less blood in her stool than last Thursday so I'm able to continue breastfeeding! YEA!!!!

MADELINE'S 2 MONTH STATS (for those of you interested):

Weight: 7 lbs. 13 oz.
Length: 21.5 inches
Both stats put her in the less-than-third percentile based on her birthdate. HOWEVER, if they adjust it to my due date (what she would be if she'd been born on my due date at the weight she was on that date) she'd be in the 50th percentile for height and ~30th percentile for weight. Woulda, coulda, shoulda...

I attempted to get some 2-month photos of Maddie, but after receiving her vaccines today, she just wasn't in the mood. Stay tuned for those.

Here is a collection of various photos taken over the last couple of months: