Crawling, Standing Up, Falling, Climbing, Swimming...

May 6, 2009: GI Appointment
We took Kayley to her GI appointment on May 6. She weighed in at 17 lbs 9 ounces which was very good. It took her from the 5th percentile to the 10th percentile for her actual age. We, including the doctor, were all very happy with her weight. This appointment didn't take too long since we already had the endoscopy scheduled for the following Friday. The doctor just gave us an overview of what he plans to do during the endoscopy and after.

May 8, 2009: Endoscopy with Pyloric Dilation
Since the last endoscopy seemed to help with Kayley's eating, we scheduled another one to actually stretch the pylorus more. If you remember from the last endoscopy, the doctor said Kayley's opening from her esophagus to her stomach was too big and from her stomach to her intestine was too small. Well, the doctor spent more time taking a look this time and actually saw the upper opening close by itself. He said it looked a lot better this time. Hopefully Kayley is out growing that issue. The lower opening was around 8 mm...too small. The doctor stretched it to 12 mm using a balloon. The procedure took a little longer this time, but we were very hopeful it would make a big difference. As for any further surgery, we're definitely putting that talk off since we had good news about the upper opening. We're hoping to get by without it.

The doctor gave us some things to watch for after the surgery. Mainly, dumping syndrome. It's when the food doesn't spend enough time in the stomach before being passed to the instestine. We were to watch for Kayley sweating and becoming lethargic after eating. Since it's been awhile since the endoscopy, I can actually report the results. The procedure didn't cause an issues like dumping syndrome but it also didn't help Kayley's eating either. Her feeding stayed the same so it looks like the procedure didn't work for Kayley. There are a couple options from here. First, we can wait to see if Kayley outgrows this. She will be 1 year old soon and it's only 3 months until she's 1 year old corrected age. Can we make it that long and then take her off the bottle? The other option would be to go in and stretch the pylorus more. I guess we'll see what the doctor recommends before we start coming to conclusions.

May 11, 2009: Developmental Pediatrician
We took Kayley to the developmental pediatrician next. Kayley weighed in at 17 lbs 11 oz but that was with her clothes. Overall, the doctor was very happy with Kayley's progress. She sat, crawled, stood up, and did pretty much everything the doctor expected and more. However, we never leave these places without homework. I think that once the child passes all the tests, they start to pick at all the little things. We need to work on Kayley standing up correctly and falling correctly. So yes, we work with her to stand up and once she's up, we push her down. Just kidding...kind of.

One bad thing that the doctor did comment on was that Kayley seems to be opinionated. Great. That's exactly what we need in the house! And last, the doctor suggested that we start giving Kayley 2 foods in every bite. For instance, when we give her crackers, we should spread cream cheese on it (we're still operating under the assumption that she's allergic to milk protein so Kayley gets imitation cream cheese called tofutti). So far so good. Kayley loves tofutti and seems to like almost everything we try. That will definitely help us get past these next few months where Kayley isn't taking the bottle so well.

As for everything else, Kayley is doing very well. She is a go getter to say the least. She hates to be held and wants to be down on the floor to explore. She's gotten into a lot of trouble already. If we don't watch her closely, we'll find her standing on her little desk chair, crawling half way up the stairs, or spilling our dog's food and water. She has no fear. We've had her in the pool once already and she loved it. Looks like it's time to get her in lessons. And for a while, we weren't sure she was ever going to talk. Now, she doesn't stop. She loves to hear herself ba, ba, ba and da, da, da.