Mmmmm....Thumb!!!!

Drew starving for attention and showing Kayley what this thumb thing is all about.

Kayley's favorite thumb.

Trying to wake Kayley up to eat late at night...it's not working too well.

Chris, Jenny, Macie, and Kayley

Kayley is 5 1/2 months old now. She is a very good baby. She sleeps through the night without any problems. We normally don't hear a peep from her between midnight and 7 or 8 am. And, I have a very hard time waking her up for her last feeding around 11:30 pm. There's a possibility she'd sleep from 9 pm to 8 am if we let her. Too bad we can't do that because we can't afford to have her miss another feeding during the day. The more calories we can give her during the day, the better.

Kayley loves her swing which makes Megan happy. She smiles a lot, talks quite a bit more, and is even starting to giggle a little bit. The biggest development since the last post though is that she has found her almighty thumb. At first we thought maybe she'd be a finger sucker because they generally made it to her mouth first, but as soon as she found her thumb that's all she goes after any more.

My last post mentioned that we changed bottles for Kayley and it seemed to do wonders. Well, that didn't last too long. I guess the newness wore off and Kayley got bored again. Feedings began to get hard and long again. She was taking about the same amount that she always had but it puts such a strain on us when a single feeding could take an hour or so. The trend has been somewhat upward since then so we're hopeful that she's getting better. She was taking an average of around 80 cc's 6 times a day. Now she's closer to the upper 80's. We're still a little concerned so we are planning on seeing a specialist to help determine what the problem is. Sometimes she just doesn't seem hungry and sometimes her suck is just really weak. Hopefully the specialist will be able to figure it out.

Kayley's last weight check was November 14. She weighed 11 lbs 4 ounces. That's between a 1/2 ounce to an ounce a day gain since the previous weigh in. It's good that she's gaining weight but her pediatrician would like to see it more consistently around the ounce a day range. Kayley is still in the bottom 3rd percentile for her actual age. She is between the 50th and 75th percentile for her adjusted age. The developmental nurse is coming again today so Kayley will be weighed again. Hopefully she gains a bunch.

We've had a number of visitors since the last post. Megan's college roommate and her family were in the area so they stayed with us a couple of days. The day before they left, Drew caught the flu. I was at the Monday Night Football game when it all started so Megan had to take care of him. Needless to say, she got it right away also. Kayley and I stayed as far away as possible because as you know, it would not be good for Kayley to get sick. That's why we don't take her out in the public much and try to keep her away from kids with runny noses and colds as much as possible. Thankfully, Kayley pretty much got through unscathed. She has had a touch of diarrhea but hasn't acted sick at all. Kayley also had her first Synagis shot on November 4. That will help protect her from RSV during RSV season. The shot works for 28 days. Our insurance company approved her for 5 shots so she'll receive one every month through March.

The next weekend, my brother Chris, his wife Jenny, and their daughter Macie came to visit. They brought more of Macie's clothes for Kayley. It's like Christmas for Kayley every time they send us a package or bring an extra suitcase full of Macie's clothes. Too bad all we did was give them some of the flu. Last I heard, Chris and Macie both came down with it.

Happy Halloween!

All Right, All Right. I Know It's Been A Long Time

I'm finally getting around to another post. Here are some more pictures and another small update. Kayley continues to do very well except for her feedings. A couple weeks ago, we switched her medicine from Axid to Prevacid. It's a stronger medicine that actually decreases the amount of acid produced in the stomach. Hopefully it does the trick.

Last week, the developmental nurse came to the house to examine Kayley. She still has no setbacks to speak of except, of course, her feeding. The nurse weighed her and she was 10lbs 9 oz. That's around a 1/2 ounce gain per day since she was last weighed. It's acceptable but we are really hoping for more. Megan phoned the results into Kayley's pediatrician. She said she's happy with the weight gain but Kayley should be gaining more to catch up to what she should be according to her actual birth age. So, she is going to calculate an increased amount of calories to start giving Kayley so we get more bang for our buck for the amount Kayley does eat. If Kayley doesn't start gaining weight more like she should, the alternative would be to put a feeding tube back in. We really don't want that to happen so we're trying everything we can.

It doesn't help that Kayley now sleeps through the night. She started doing it last week. I feed her one last time late at night between 11:30 pm and midnight and then she sleeps until 8 am or 9 am in the morning. That's great for us but it cuts out another feeding during the day.

On Friday, we had a small revelation. We really liked the BPA-free bottles we got for Kayley and she seemed to take to them right away. However, we wondered if maybe she would like a different bottle better and start eating better. Luckily we had another type of bottle at home and we were able to try it Saturday afternoon. The only thing is that I had to do some handy work to make the hole in the nipple bigger for the cereal to come out. After we got everything ready, Kayley went to town. Evidently, she loves the new nipple on the new bottle. Saturday night she was taking around 90 cc's easily instead of her normal 70 struggling cc's. Then on Sunday, she continued on her new streak and averaged over 90 cc's per bottle. Instead of taking an hour or so to feed her, she was finishing the bottle in 15 minutes! We are so relieved right now. Hopefully this continues and it turns out that the bottle was the major issue. The nipples are very different and she just seems more comfortable now. The old nipples must have just worn her out. Megan picked up some more bottles today, so hopefully we got it right this time.

It's also worth noting that the Prevacid could be starting to work too. The directions say it could take 2-4 weeks for it to start to work. We're just past 2 weeks now. I can't imagine that it would make that much of an impact in one day but who knows. We'll chalk it up to the new bottle and the Prevacid for now.