On This Day...

ADDISON DRANK 10 OUNCES OF LIQUID BY MOUTH!!!!!!!

8 ounces of Pedisure, 2 ounces of water!!!

We have bought her every cup you can imagine but the end result was nothing more then a few sips totaling an ounce or less if we were lucky. So this is amazingly huge for her. Wanna know what the trick was? Letting her drink from a water bottle. So silly and simple. I would say I should have thought of this sooner but we did let her drink from them before but she just wasn't interested. I can truly say that I feel like she is finally ready to talk on this challenge. I couldn't be more proud.

Her menu today looked like this:

5.3 ounces of Peach Greek Yogurt
Snacked on Cheerios
One slice of deli turkey and a half slice of Swiss Cheese
About 5 Veggie Straws
One container of purees (Sweet Potato and Corn) thickened with Mixed Grain Cereal
3 more Veggie Straws
8 ounces of Pedisure
2 ounces of water

Keep in mind that in addition to hydration 8 ounces of Pedisure is equal to one whole meal. We've been giving her an 8 ounce bolus of Pedisure each night before bed via G-tube, but since she had already drank half of her Pedisure just before dinner and then ate fairly well, I didn't want to over feed her. We'll see how she does overnight and play it by ear from here.

This is so so very huge because all of this is forward progress towards removing her G-tube. We have a follow up with her Pedi on 11/27 and GI on Dec 7 (I think, I'll have to double check that date lol). We'll see what the Pedi says and how here weight is on the 27th and hopefully he can give us some tips on what we need to address with GI (if anything at all).

It has by far been the most challenging part of this journey so far and so many things I never thought I'd do as a parent has changed in the process. It quickly became the theory of "Whatever Works and Gets Addison Eating". We've had meals in front of the tv, because it helped her to zone out and distracted her so that she wasn't focusing on and becoming overwhelmed by eating. I've given up more control then I ever thought, because it works for her. I always thought there would have to be this progression from spoon feeding to self feeding but it quickly went from "Mommy do it" to "Addison do it". I thought she would eat this instead of that. When I say I have tried it all with her, I am not kidding. We have. Anything and everything. Hot foods, cold foods, spicy foods, salty foods, sweet foods. Ice tea, Milk, water, juice. Been there, done that, tried it all. Still a work in progess, but progress is measured in leaps and bounds around here now.

And that ladies and gentleman is what's been going on with Addison.