Yesterday Aleck had his 4th casting and I learned just how little time I’ve spent, or been able to spend, learning about the different procedures we have dove head first into. Namely, the Ponsetti method. Silly me, I thought 6-7 weeks of casting, tendon cutting, and then maybe some PT for it. Whoops…wrong answer, thanks for playing. The tendon cutting will be followed by having a cast on for 3 weeks and then we get to introduce Aleck and ourselves to the “shoes”. From what I now understand he’ll wear these shoes 23 hours a day for another 3 months (maybe longer), and then only at night until he’s 3 according to my docs, 5 according to other docs. I honestly thought we could at least get this corrected before his long term memory kicked in, and I have to admit my heart sank when they pulled these shoes out. They just look like some medical relic from the 60’s and trying to imagine him in them was just too much. We’ve joked that we have our own Forest Gump, physically that is, definitely not cognitively since Aleck has already shown signs of seriously intelligent life. I don’t know why I didn’t read all of this before, why I thought we’d have some sort of break from one treatment to the next since his hip surgery will probably be at about 7 months. I think the reality that there literally is no break for us in the future is starting to hit me.
On top of everything else I’ve been writing about how fussy Aleck has been getting, inconsolable crying at all hours, and screaming when he poops and farts. So we got in to see the GI today and came out with two new medications and a list of issues. As I’m driving there I was rehearsing what I would say to Dr. Bass, word for word, thinking that maybe Aleck was just fine and I was making a big deal out of nothing. After all, he’d been really good today and yesterday, and maybe this screaming while pooping/farting thing had passed. Lucky for me and the good doctor, Aleck was in rare form when we arrived. He had eaten an hour before so he was in prime screaming mode for the entire office to enjoy. Oh goody!! Even the experience doctor wasn’t able to settle him with the usual tricks. I was able to get him calm, eventually, and of course he pooped and farted. You could literally feel the gas even through the splint!! Clearly something was wrong.
After the examination here’s the list of what’s going on. He may have a mild case of thrush, which would explain why I’ve been having trouble pumping any spare milk out of me lately, and he’s now on meds for that. There is definitely acid reflux still going on so we are trying another medication to help with that as well. He also thinks that there are these large air bubbles getting caught in Aleck when he breasts feeds making him unhappy when I burp him (he screams during a lot of his burp
ing), unhappy when he spits up (not like the “happy spit-up” babies I keep reading about in the books & magazines), miserable when he poops and farts, and passing these air pockets with such force has created a small fissure on his bottom. That’s right folks, he has a rip in his tushie (awwww…poor little tush). So we have to adapt a serious regimen of extreme burping techniques to help him out. We are already having mixed results.
Now, on my own I’ve been trying to figur
e out what’s going on. I’ve been off milk products for two weeks and that has stopped him from screaming during his feeds, and I’ve read about “colic” in every book and magazine I’ve been able to get my hands on. The definition is totally different everywhere you go, most authors separating acid reflux from colic altogether. From my standpoint colic seems to be this general fussiness and unsettled feeling that babies get which some authors will hint that is caused by the parent’s behavior (IE; “In some cultures colic doesn’t exist” or “In the hundreds of babies I’ve worked with I’ve never had an issue with colic”). These people should be taken out back and shot. My GI says that the bubbles that are getting caught in Aleck are colic, that’s what he calls it!! My heart just sank again, now on top of everything else my poor baby is “colicky”. Clearly we can’t get a break in any aspect of this new adventure. And the best part, is that they recommend these babies don’t wear any tight or form fitting clothing since it only makes it worse. Like, ummm, some molded to his body hip splint? Ugh.
At least we are doing one thing to keep our sanity during this process, giving him a bottle at about 10-11 every night. He very often goes to sleep for 4 hours and he doesn’t suck in all that air when he gets a bottle so it settles him and buys us some desperately needed sleep. Last night he slept for 5.5 hours in a row, took his ungodly hour feed from me, and th
en crashed for another 2.5. Awesome!! It’s amazing what good sleep can do, I felt like a normal person today, and I think I’m averaging 1-2 days of normalcy a week, not too shabby.
And just in case I didn’t have enough on my plate, I’ve also been working on getting my orders from my Groupon customers delivered, picking up events, and picking up more portrait sessions. I’m just barely able to stay on top of my email, even with my two retouchers working for me, so if you want to talk to me just be patient…I’ll get to you…eventually 😉