barely 10 oz yesterday…

[Anonymous]

ok so I thought he was getting better well..not so much…yesterday I could barely get him to eat..choking and gagging on every bottle, threw up undigested prevacid HOURS after I gave it to him….called the doc today was told that “because he’s in the 90th percentile it does not matter how much he eats”. What the ….I asked how much he should be eating was told 28 oz…I said well the most he eats is 12-14.but aparent;y because he is roly poly that isn’t an issue…i told them how even in the hospital he went 8 hours without eating and they had to take him back to the nicu to try to get him to eat..told them how he gags on every bottle, chokes and sputters, spits the formula out, won’t swallow it. they said (for the 2nd time) that I must be forceing him to eat..then I said well i tried to feed him and he’s screaming and it has been a good 5 hours and the last time he has eaten he ony ate 2 oz….still just a eh he’ll eat when he feels like it…..I put him back on the 30 mg of prevacid after deducing that the ped gi we saw was a moron….but she was the only one that takes our insurance…..even she was like look he’s soooooo chunky why are you here? THE PROBLEM IS he won’t eat… I don’t get where the weight came from or how it’s staying there…I don’t think they even believe me..I am at the point where I want to park myself at the dr’s office all day and SHOW her what he does when he gets hungry and to prove to her that he does indeed only get about 12ish ounces in him……why is it that they’ll only listen if he begins to lose a ton of weight????? Aidansmom792006-2-27 14:13:7

[Anonymous]

Jill… Oh, boy do I feel your pain and Know your story. Don’t let anyone tell you that there’s nothing wrong because he’s gaining weight. everytime I hear that now, I say “thank you” and never go back to that doctor. We’re just now at 9 months getting some attention after both my ped and another doc I saw said that Hailey likely has severe esophageal damage, and my ped said “this is not the norm for reflux.”. He says he’s only seen one case this bad in all of his time as a doctor. Stick to your guns with this one. You know your little guy. I hope he feels better after upping his dose again.

[Anonymous]

Noah far from being a chunky baby (10th percentile) and I still had a tough time getting anyone to listen to me when I told them that he didnt want to eat. It took me 8 months to even get a referral to a GI doc, and then even he dismissed me. I honestly dont think many docs have any clue how to deal with a baby who doesnt eat. Its easier for them to brush us off, especially if the baby is growing well. All I can tell you is to be persistant, and go for a second opinion from another GI.

Has anyone suggested a swallow study? Babies can choke and cough if they are aspirating. I know that its not uncommon for a baby to refuse to eat as a way of protecting their airway. You could always try to thicken his bottle to see if that makes a difference. I wish I could give you some other advice on how to get Aidan to eat, but I’m in the same boat and have been now for 10.5 months. I use a sryinge a lot of times to feed him his milk. If I distract him with a toy, I can ususally feed him without too much resistance.

I hope he starts feeling better soon. Big hugs!

[Anonymous]

thanks guys, and yeah he has cereal in his bottle, I have tried lessing it and adding more to see how he reacts. Maybe once the bigger amount of prevacid gets back in his system he’ll get better. I’m trying to get him actual insurance as opossed to medicaid as with medicaid our options on docs are kind of limited (and the ones who take it well they are not that great as I am finding out).

[Anonymous]

Jill, how much cereal are you using? Kaelyn needed 1 Tbsp per ounce of formula to get the formula thick enough that she didn’t immediately spit it back up. Of course, it’s so hard to know, you might be right that he needs it thinner rather than thicker. With her formula thickened that much, she still spit up a lot, but it wasn’t anywhere near as much and it didn’t seem to bother her as much. She never took more than about 20 oz a day and the ped and ped GI said that was plenty since she was also getting a good amount of calories from the cereal. I know that probably doesn’t help when he’s only taking in 10 oz, but I just wanted to point out that the “magic number” of oz of formula isn’t always so high. I hope that he improves soon!

[Anonymous]

Kim,

Sorry if this question is repetitive, but how did you get it to flow out of the nipple at 1 tbsp cereal per ounce? Did you have to blend it?

[Anonymous]

Lori, I’m not going to be much help with this one, I’m afraid. Kaelyn was actually a comfort feeder and she had a really, really strong suck. So, we actually were constantly trying to slow down the amount of food that she was getting at a time (I feel bad even saying that with the issues that so many of you are having). If she took in a 2 oz bottle in less than 10 or 15 minutes, it would all come right back up. So, we used Level 1 nipples (Dr. Brown’s) and it would take her about 20 minutes to drink her 2-3 oz bottle.

I know that a lot of other people have used Y cut nipples to make it easier for the formula to come out. Kaelyn choked when we tried those. Some others used smaller nipples, but used a needle to widen the hole. Others have mentioned using a smaller nipple, but running it through the dishwasher several times to break it in and make it flow a little easier.

[Anonymous]

Jill – has he been diagnosed with delayed gastric emptying? The fact that he is spitting up the prevacid hours later surely is a sign?

[Anonymous]

Nope his doc hasn’t mentioned DGE at all…although it seems like any idiot woulod want to test him as the kid has (today for example) gone from eating at 7 pm 3 oz, to waiting until 9 am to eat yet another 3 oz. BUT no one seems really overly concerned…if anyone has pointers on how to nicely ask a dr to test for DGE without offending them by (which I might do if I got angry ) calling them an uneducated inconsiderate moron, I kind of need some help trying to get the doc to listen..

[Anonymous]

Not sure if this will help, but can you video tape one days worth of feedings and show/mail it to the dr? Then ask if there is nothing wrong. Sometimes you have to put it right in their faces for them to get it…………

[Anonymous]

that’s not a bad idea, but I’m afraid she would just say see, he’s not hungry and you’re forcing him to eat (what she told me when I mentioned the gagging)…I just called the ped GI we saw and said that I would like to understand how a baby can go so long on so little food, and spit up undigested medicine…

[Anonymous]

Jill,

I’d just flat out ask the doc about the possibility of a stomach emptying scan. Tell him that you are concerened because he is spitting up undigested food several hours later. Not to mention the fact that he seems like he isnt hungry since he’s going long stretches in between eating. Be persistant! I had this exact same issue and I mentioned it over and over to anyone that saw Noah for his feeding issues. Finally I got a doc to agree that a scan was a good idea. We are scheduled for the test next Monday.

[Anonymous]

Jill, I too would push for the test. But I just wanted to mention that there was a thread going on here not too long ago about someone else’s child who was spitting up “purple”- i.e. prevacid solutabs several hours after eating. You can do a search, I don’t know how to post links. I’ll try to look it up for you when I get a chance, because I believe that Joel explained how this is a drawback of the medication itself or something like that…. can’t quite remember. How’s he doing today?

[Anonymous]

well not sure how to gauge it but ok so far today it;a 11:40 and he’s eaten 6 oz..I think I will just askf or the scan, sometimes I feel like they don’t like it if you try to tell them what YOU think is wrong though…but I’m going to ask anyway!!!

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately, i think we have all been dismissed at one time or another. At Least that seems to be the norm. No one would listen to me until Gabriel became “Failure to Thrive” and then it was ALOT harder to get him to put on enough weight. Keep trying until you find a doctor who will listen, even if that doctor is not a ped gi. Don’t let things get as bad as I did–because then it is harder to get them to eat. Have you tried a pediatric occupational therapist? They are trained to help children who have severe aversions to food. They can help you find a way to feed your son so that he will accept it. They might be mor helpful than the GI docs you’ve seen.

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