Back Home in Kansas City

I'm exhausted.... sitting here on our couch in KC. It's been a long intensive 3 weeks - but we are finally back home. I'm sorry I didn't get round to a blog yesterday - it was kind of rushed and by the time I rolled into bed I really wanted sleep more than to blog...

So how has the feeding been going with Josiah - better and better - it seems now that each feed we are getting in to him over 500 cals - which is amazing - yesterday was a new record of 1850 cals in the day. Amazing as it's all by mouth. We said goodbye to Ben and Jessica (Ben's Assistant) finally last night - stocked up on all feeding supplies and Shari is now well equipped in the feeding protocol that we have to be very rigid about keeping for the next few months - after that we can look at different flavours and textures - which is apparently a very easy step up once Josiah has truly learnt how to swallow each bite properly. In the meantime we will stick with the high calorie food and get a little step up on the growth charts.

Today was going to be an interesting challenge - feeding Josiah while traveling all day - a challenge which we passed well - even if Josiah was tired and whiney the whole flight back from San Francisco - (Sorry to all passengers on the Mid West Flight). It really helps that we can get over 500 cals per meal in to him - then add in a few drink snacks and he was going great - Even though we only managed 2 main feeds we still managed to get around 1600 cals into him - and he drank quite a bit of this on the plane. One thing I love about feeding him by mouth is the fact that he does not spit up - we can feed him some milk by cup on the plane and I am confident he is not going to spit up - amazing.

So what's my assessment of the three weeks

Week 1 - Josiah lost a bunch of weight (8oz) and feeding was hard - he cried alot and spit up alot during the meal - but the resistance gradually tapered off - the first weekend when we had to put in the tube again was not so pleasant - much spit up in many places all over the bay area. However the one saving grace is that he regained some of the lost ounces.

Week 2 - Still lost weight- but Tuesday/Wednesday a corner was turned - he ate a whole lot better - and from then on he has been going great - putting on weight. Eating more and more solids in one setting.

Week 3 - A week of parent training - It is not easy with NG babies - he still finds swallowing hard - and feeds are still 30-40 mins - but they are getting better. The weight gain which started last week took off - now Josiah is gaining an average of 3 oz per day - which is pretty amazing.

The primary purpose we went was to remove Josiah's dependency on the NG tube - and we have achieved that very well

Now I must go to bed....