I’m exhausted…. sitting here on our couch in KC. It’s been a long intensive 3 weeks – but we are finally back home. I’m sorry I didn’t get round to a blog yesterday – it was kind of rushed and by the time I rolled into bed I really wanted sleep more than to blog…

So how has the feeding been going with Josiah – better and better – it seems now that each feed we are getting in to him over 500 cals – which is amazing – yesterday was a new record of 1850 cals in the day. Amazing as it’s all by mouth. We said goodbye to Ben and Jessica (Ben’s Assistant) finally last night – stocked up on all feeding supplies and Shari is now well equipped in the feeding protocol that we have to be very rigid about keeping for the next few months – after that we can look at different flavours and textures – which is apparently a very easy step up once Josiah has truly learnt how to swallow each bite properly. In the meantime we will stick with the high calorie food and get a little step up on the growth charts.

Today was going to be an interesting challenge – feeding Josiah while traveling all day – a challenge which we passed well – even if Josiah was tired and whiney the whole flight back from San Francisco – (Sorry to all passengers on the Mid West Flight). It really helps that we can get over 500 cals per meal in to him – then add in a few drink snacks and he was going great – Even though we only managed 2 main feeds we still managed to get around 1600 cals into him – and he drank quite a bit of this on the plane. One thing I love about feeding him by mouth is the fact that he does not spit up – we can feed him some milk by cup on the plane and I am confident he is not going to spit up – amazing.

So what’s my assessment of the three weeks

Week 1 – Josiah lost a bunch of weight (8oz) and feeding was hard – he cried alot and spit up alot during the meal – but the resistance gradually tapered off – the first weekend when we had to put in the tube again was not so pleasant – much spit up in many places all over the bay area. However the one saving grace is that he regained some of the lost ounces.

Week 2 – Still lost weight- but Tuesday/Wednesday a corner was turned – he ate a whole lot better – and from then on he has been going great – putting on weight. Eating more and more solids in one setting.

Week 3 – A week of parent training – It is not easy with NG babies – he still finds swallowing hard – and feeds are still 30-40 mins – but they are getting better. The weight gain which started last week took off – now Josiah is gaining an average of 3 oz per day – which is pretty amazing.

The primary purpose we went was to remove Josiah’s dependency on the NG tube – and we have achieved that very well

Now I must go to bed….