February 11, 2010

Today's 6 month well baby visit was a pretty big event! The pediatrician Charlotte has been seeing was out of town so we saw Dr. Colleen. She was great, actually sitting down and talking with us over growth charts and feeding information (as opposed to rushing through the visit and being vague in response to our questions). This doctor does not accept the wait-and-see approach with her feeds, emphasizing that things will get easier and that this is not permanent.

Colleen is a D.O. and specializes in Cranial Manipulation. Her own children were 27 week twins and her daughter's feeding issues were corrected by this practice and she was then inspired to become an expert in this area herself. I've been Googling Cranial Manipulation and its validity is questioned for use in adults because the skull is no longer very malleable, but hopefully it works for Charlotte. It's very low risk - she'll basically be receiving weekly skull massages.

She also clipped the skin under Charlotte's tongue. Charlotte was tongue tied (the skin under her tongue was attached to the tip of her tongue), preventing her from having full mobility with her tongue. This should not have prevented her from eating out of the bottle, but did prevent her from nursing. We still won't push nursing unless she shows interest. It's not something Patrick or I have been devastated I can't do, so we'll just follow Charlotte's lead. The tongue-tied issue is something doctors have noticed and thought wasn't an immediate concern. We'd been told she may need to have it clipped if she were to have speech difficulties later on, and we're just glad she had it clipped now so she won't remember the procedure.

Charlotte screamed for most of this appointment with the cranial manipulation (not painful, she's just very sensitive), the tongue clipping, and then 4 shots. Poor baby! It was a tough way for her to start the day.