Cat got your tongue?

Sorry this is such a late post...but things have been uber hectic the last week. On Tuesday of last week Aislinn had a pedi GI appt. because of her slow weight gain.

At her 2 month well baby check (she was 10 weeks old) she weighed 7lbs 8.5ozs, she was 6lbs 2ozs at birth. The Dr was concerned about her weight. I came home a bit upset. We did have issues with Riley...he fell off the charts, we had constant weight checks, and my poor baby boy had 14 vials of blood taken from him. In the end, he was just a small baby and was back on the charts by 1 year. So I was thinking we were going to have all the same problems with Aislinn. I did some research again (I want to be informed when I talked to the dr again) and I called a local La Leche League Leader. I talked to friends, and read a lot on Kellymom.com. I knew she was on the small side, but she was having enough wet/dirty diapers everyday, so I figured breastfeeding was going fine. A lot of what I have read says as long as they are gaining, even if it's on their own curve, and they aren't up and down, then they are fine.

She had been nursing on only one side, and seemed satisfied after nursing. But after that appt, I started offering both sides every single time. She would nurse on both sides happily, so I continued to do this. We went back for a weight check 2 weeks later. Aislinn had gained about 3.5ozs. She was up to 7lbs 12ozs. I was a bit disappointed, our home scale said she was 8.4lbs (our scale doesn't do ozs, it does .2, .4, .6 etc) so we figured she was at least 8lbs. I guess our home scale is off. At this point, her Dr said she wanted to send her to a Pediatric GI specialist. I really didn't want to after what we went through with Riley, but agreed to it.

2 weeks after the weight check, we had the GI appt, which was Tuesday of last week. When they weighed her, she had lost 3ozs, I was so upset I was crying. My husband kept telling me it would be ok, but I was really upset. She had dropped back down to 7lbs 8.8ozs. The Dr. walked in and immediately said it was not a GI problem. He asked who did her PKU test and then he left to go try to find out her PKU results. When he came back he had a lady with him. He said that he found her PKU results, and he checked them for Cystic Fibrosis, he said that it can cause the body to not absorb food the right way. I'm freaked out...hubby says I turned white when he mentioned it. But then he went on to say her results were normal. Let me tell you...that dr needs to learn a better way to lead into good news!

The lady was a 'breastfeeding expert'. She started talking about my production and how it's already been 3 months, so she wasn't sure how much she could help, but she would try to boost my supply as much as she could. She was talking about how the breasts start to shut down, etc. I mentioned that if I skip a feeding and pump that I can get 3-4ozs. At that point she said it wasn't production and it was a transfer issue. I told her I thought we had no issues with latch, I haven't had any soreness whe latching or unlatching, or during nursing. So she decided to check Aislinn's suck and she found the tongue tie. She pulled her finger out and said it was a tongue tie and it was like a huge weight had been lifted off my chest. A tongue tie was an easily fixable issue, and not something too serious.

The GI Dr said he wants to see her put on some weight, if she doesn't then he wants to admit her. They gave me an SNS (supplemental nursing system) so I can still nurse, and Aislinn can get formula (for now) while nursing. This way we can keep our nursing relationship. They gave me a recipe to make Good Start formula 24 calories (formula for preemies is only 22 calories) so we are really cranking up her extra calories. They also have me taking Fenygreek, Blessed Milk Thistle, and Mother's Milk Tea to boost my supply some more.

We were suppose to go back for a weight check on March 8th, but we got rescheduled to March 15th. So we have at least 1 more week of her eating formula too. They said if she had been under 30 days old they could have fixed the tongue tie right there in the office, but because she was already 3 months old we have to schedule a surgery to have it fixed. We are still waiting to hear back on when her surgery will be. Eventually we are hoping to switch out the formula for my frozen breastmilk. I was hoping that she would have had enough weight gain by the 8th to switch to breastmilk then, but now we have to wait until the 15th at least. But I am very glad that they are working with me to let me keep breastfeeding.

So that's what has been going on the last week. It's been pretty hectic, nursing takes much longer now with all the prep time for the formula and the SNS.