Episode 11: Eat, Pap, EAT! - Part 4 - Final Installment!

So, here it is, the conclusion to our saga. Enjoy!

Just to remind you, at this point we were still breastfeeding. Often. Three times during the day, and once overnight. It was getting really old. I am a huge proponent of breastfeeding, and I was sure that I was going to breastfeed my child, but after nearly 18 months of being the only source of nourishment, I was kind of tired of it. Plus, we never properly trained Little Man to take a bottle, so we could never go anywhere alone for more than an hour or two. I was getting really tired of getting up once a night and breastfeeding. And it wasn’t even like when you get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, where you do it all kind of half-asleep, you had to be up for around 30 minutes! Although, to be honest, I think I was getting really good at sleeping in a chair with a baby latched on. And, LM was starting to have better things to do than breastfeed. He would eat, but most of the time, he would be squirmy and would have preferred playing to nursing.

So, finally, it was March 3. We didn’t know whether we should bring food to the appointment, since this was supposed to be a sort of “update on testing that’s been done/decide whether and what treatment to do, if any” appointment. We brought food just in case. When we got into the exam room, and our team came in, the nutritionist and behavioral therapist were the same ladies we saw at the first appointment, and who I had been talking to on the phone for 4 months! Thank God!! I was so happy to see their faces! It was a good thing we brought food, because they did want to see the Little Man eat, and they were impressed! They were amazed by the progress he had made, and even decided that he didn’t need any treatment program at the moment. They advised that we should keep trying different foods, and different textures, and just keep him eating. Also at this appointment, the physician we saw said to us, “Has anyone ever mentioned the possibility that he might just be small?” I almost leapt up and hugged the man! That’s what I had been trying to tell the doctors all along, but everyone was so concerned with the not-swallowing, that I think they were convinced that was why LM wasn’t gaining weight. I had even brought my own weight and height records for my childhood, as I was very tiny, too. The nutritionist, based on what we were feeding him at that time, also told me that I could wean the Little Man as soon as I wanted. I almost cried. I was so excited to have someone tell me that the Little Man was finally eating enough that I could start to wean him. And, it was also very liberating that he was no longer depending mainly on me for his nourishment all day, every day. What a relief!! 

Over the next four weeks, the Little Man weaned from breastfeeding without any problems. He even had the courtesy to make our last-ever nursing session really unpleasant, so it wasn’t too sad for me to stop nursing. I do miss it a little bit, but more than that, I am happy to see that my little guy is thriving and eating like a normal toddler. 

For a little while after this appointment, the Little Man was swallowing more and more food at each meal. We had explained to him that he had to eat every bite, and “swallow it down to your tummy.” This was accompanied by a sign of drawing a finger from mouth down the body to the tummy. LM started signing this during meals as he was eating. We also would ask him if he had finished each bite before giving him more food. He would open his empty mouth to show that he had swallowed. If he still had food, we reminded him to swallow to his tummy, and he would sign back to us, and then swallow. It was like my husband had said at our first KKI appointment, maybe we just had to wait until he was old enough to understand when we told him to swallow his food!

Now, the Little Man eats almost a regular toddler diet! He certainly eats normal to large meals three times a day, plus a couple of snacks. We are still avoiding all of his allergen foods; so unfortunately, he can’t eat many things recommended for toddlers, like cheese and yogurt. And, almost all of Gerber’s toddler foods contain some sort of milk or soy. In many ways, that’s a good thing, because I can’t resort to the easy way out - buying pre-made foods for the Little Man. I hope that this will also help to deter me from buying a lot of pre-made foods for him as he gets older. I’m trying to get into the habit of making all of our dinners, and I should probably start making many of the other foods we eat as well, and I firmly believe that a continued avoidance of manufactured foods will help to give him a firm foundation of liking healthy foods.

We still have to be really careful about what the Little Man eats, we still have to check ingredients on anything we use, or anything we eat at anyone else’s house. We have to be sure that anyone who takes care of the Little Man knows about his allergies, and knows how severe they can be, and knows how careful they need to be about what he eats. We still need to be careful when we go to a party, and make sure that we check things, and provide LM with safe food. We often have to pack his food when we eat away from home. We can’t usually order food for him from the kid’s menu at restaurants, and we always need to check with the servers to see if there are dairy ingredients used to prepare his food. 

This story isn’t finished yet. We have another appointment with the allergist on August 30, to have more blood testing done, to see if he is still allergic to these foods. I hope to hear that he’s grown out of his allergies, but I am not pinning all of my hopes on that outcome. We are also planning to participate in a study on EE that is being run by Dr. Wood at Johns Hopkins. I’m not sure what our participation in this study will involve, but I hope that it will help others. I really think that this whole process has made me feel stronger and more confident as a mother. I’ve also really had to examine myself and convince myself that I didn’t do anything to cause any of these eating problems. I really hope that someone out there will be helped with my story. If anyone has any questions, or just wants to talk, leave me a comment, I’d be happy to talk about this more with you!

Have the other mothers out there had a child with a similar, or other on-going problem? Are you still struggling with it? How did it feel when it was finally resolved?