December 22, 2009

All ready for her baptism

Getting good at holding on to things

When we came home we were at 17 cm, now we're at 22 cm

Opening a present from the Hoeper's

Last Wednesday Charlotte had her two month eye surgery follow-up in Marquette. It had been scheduled for two weeks ago, but the weather conspired against us at we had to push it back. She got a clean bill of health so it was all worth it.

Her feeding hasn't progressed a whole lot percentage-wise, but the gross amount she takes by bottle is increasing. She just can't quite keep up with her increasing feeds. Every once in awhile she'll take a large amount by bottle and we'll get a glimpse into what feeding like for most babies. I remember last week when she calmly took 50mls (out of 70) and it was pure bliss.

Katie consulted with Jen, Charlotte's speech therapist at Children's Hospital, and the decision has been made to have the gastronomy tube put in. Now that Charlotte is outpatient things are little more tricky, but Katie managed to get her clinic consult and surgery scheduled on back-to-back days so we won't have to take two trips. The post-surgery recovery is 2-5 days so we could be there up to a week, but after 2.5 months there this fall, a week seems luxuriously short.

Some people have asked if the g-tube is really necessary if she is gaining weight. Right now she takes, on average, about 25% of each feed from the bottle, which means about 75% is getting poured down her NG tube. The NG tube works fine, but as she gets older it will become more problematic. We can already tell that reinserting it is much more of an ordeal than it used to be. It takes a lot longer to calm her afterwords.

Also, to prevent her from pulling it out constantly, we have to keep gloves on her hands most of the time which we worry may inhibit her development. Grabbing and manipulating things is pretty central to motor skill and brain development. Also simply taking the NG tube out of her esophagus might help her turn the corner with her feeding because it won't be constantly irritating her throat causing coughs and reflux.

The g-tube isn't the ideal solution, that would be no tubes at all, but long-term it will be better for Charlotte. So back to Milwaukee.

We hope that everyone is getting settled in for a happy holiday season. Charlotte looks forward to Skyping with family back home this holiday weekend.