Myla Learns to Eat: Weaning Day 11

I haven't kept up the blow by blow because of a healthy mixture of exhaustion and being busy, which was actually Markus Wilken's advice the day that we put the tube back in. He noticed the exhaustion on my face, the stress, and probably the fact that I hadn't shaved in a while. He told me to only do a play picnic with Myla if we wanted to, but go outside, enjoy the weather and enjoy my family. That we did. We had my best friend Marty and his lovely fiance Anne here on Saturday. They saw Myla enjoy a play picnic, and then thanks to Pop Pop Glen, the four of us enjoyed some delicious food at Tortugas in Lambertville. On Saturday, we spent the day with Preston fam, including Elias (3 y/o) and Thalia (14 monthsish). On Sunday, Myla ate. She ate eggs and toast for breakfast, bites of my sub, jelly sandwich, puffs, potato chips, veggie burger, pretzels, roasted vegetables,2/3rds of a Ellas Kitchen (which MomMom and Pop Pop Ken got to see) squeezeable puree and bread. Today, she ate a full frozen yogurt push-up deal, 2 chicken nuggets, graham crackers, 1/3 squeezable puree, pasta with meatsauce and veggie crumbles, many puffs, some vanilla frozen yogurt, and I am sure some stuff that I am not remembering. We are so proud. She continues to develop the oral motor skills in an autonomous way that months of feeding therapy could not do. She is constantly reaching for and crying for food (mainly the puffs or the gerber graduate crunchies), but she is chewing and swallowing and just wanting more. We are hovering her tube feeds to 50% (actually probably less, because they aren't high calorie formula feeds, straight regular formula.

This evening, while doing her tube feeding, Myla was eating some strawberry flavored puffs and reaching and whining for more. The inner teacher in my lovely wife, instead of bowing to her desire, used it as a teachable moment, and taught her the universal sign for "more." After a few "trials," she got it. Having the intrinsic motivation to eat has also opened up a whole new cognitive experience for Myla. She makes cause and effect connections that have opened up her world. Its amazing to watch.

We are still struggling with the drinking, especially with anything but water. If she is thirsty or interested, she will drink some water from a glass, but thats pretty much it. Also, last night was a terrible night of crying and waking up, which led to a rough day at work today. But enough of that negativity, we are so thrilled with her progress. We are going to stay at the 50% mark of tube feedings and hope her weight has stabilized with all of the eating that she has been doing. We will have a weight check on Wednesday. I guess that's enough for tonight. Thanks for reading and all of your well wishes.