I take it all back.

I just read my last post and it made me sigh. Loudly.

Here's why:

The belly aches Violet was getting wasn't from the Prilosec. It was just reflux. I'm fairly certain at this point that she was just adjusting to the new meds and they hadn't kicked in fully yet - and by starting to wean her virtually immediately after putting her on it, I unknowingly signed myself (and Violet) up for a horrible month/six weeks-ish.

She started doing better during the daytime because she's getting a little older, and spending more time upright, therefore she was feeling less crappy/screaming less.

As I continued to wean her off the meds, however, she started doing really REALLY bad at night. Like...up every 45 minutes screaming kind of bad. Like...want to step in front of a train because I'm so tired bad. Like...spending unhealthy amounts of time staring off into space before realizing my baby was STILL crying in my arms bad. BAD, PEOPLE.

That's when we went to the pediatric gastroenterologist. After a (much too) quick conversation with me asking about her symptoms, he launched into an "EVERY PEDIATRICIAN DIAGNOSES REFLUX MUCH TOO QUICKLY!" tirade and told me he was convinced she actually has a protein intolerance and an extra-EXTRA fancy, ultra broken down, incredibly UNBELIEVABLY expensive ($56 per can?!?!?!? YIKES) formula was the answer. It's called Neocate aka send-your-entire-paycheck-directly-to-this-company-because-depositing-it-is-just-an-unnecessary-step-at-this-point.

I already knew she had a protein intolerance. Hence our struggle finding Gerber Good Start Gentle. What he was saying backed up my suspicions about the evils of reflux medicines and sounded legit (I mean, he's a specialist, right????) so we went with it. I stopped her reflux meds completely. I put her on Neocate. I waited for the miracle of sleep to occur.

Sleep...did...NOT...occur...

Plus she stopped eating. So, that was fantastic.

She was eating 3-4 ounces every 3-4 hours before starting Neocate.

She dropped that down to 1-2 ounces every 3-4 hours after.

THIS IS A SIX MONTH OLD CHILD, PEOPLE. An 18 pounder at that!! Eating 1-2 ounces?!

I called the doctor freaking out after 24 hours.

Apparently he wasn't super concerned because hey! she's a big, fat baby. "Give it another few days."

After a week I told that GI specialist (in my head) to shove it and I threw that expensive can of formula in the freaking trash can and picked up Gerber Good Start Gentle RTF (liquid form).

She still didn't sleep.

I called my pediatrician bawling my eyes out.

"It's reflux," he said,"Give her medicine for it."

"But the specialist told me it ISN'T reflux! And the medicine gives her a belly ache??"

"Nope," he said, "if anything, it will just give her some diarrhea. She has reflux. Trust me."

So I (BEGRUDGINGLY) forced my poor baby to swallow a teaspoon and a half of that sick nasty omeprazole (Prilosec). She literally spit it back in my face. It was disgusting. And a little bit funny. But mostly disgusting.

Guess what.

ASODAIEFSIOGRNSOIGNOAWJFOAMWOPHR EITHNPOENAOPWMRAR
UUUUGGGBHHHHHH Sorry.

Deep breath.

SHE SLEPT.

MY CHILD HAS REFLUX.

AND I STARTED WEANING HER OFF THE MEDICINE BECAUSE I THOUGHT IT WAS GIVING HER A BELLY ACHE WHEN REALLY IT WAS JUST REFLUX AND SHE NEEDED MORE MEDICINE.

I

HATE

REFLUX.

She slept for five hours last night. All you moms with brand new babies who are getting more sleep than I am at night can just KEEP IT TO YOURSELVES!! Haha. But seriously.

She's up from her nap and I need to go get her.

The moral of the story is that I know nothing and I need to just remember that.

What's new.

It's been a few weeks since we started Violet on Prilosec.

*WAIT* First...let me apologize for EVERY blog post being about reflux lately. haha. I'M SORRY. Reflux just happens to be my life at the moment, and every time I Google something it seems like a blog written by another Mom helps me out. SO! Continuing on...

Prilosec is great.

The dosage our pediatrician gave us is not so great.

He prescribed 1 & 1/2 tsp. per day. That amount DESTROYED her poor tummy. The question in my mind quickly became: "Sure, it makes the reflux go away...but are the horrendous abdominal cramping/gas/pain the meds give her WORTH it..???"

I've been slowly decreasing her dosage amount every ten days or so to see how little we can get by on. It seems the less I give her, the better she sleeps (fewer tummy aches between her all-night feedings) - but if I back her off too quickly she'll get acid rebound (where the stomach produces too much acid = reflux flare up disaster).

She's currently on 3/8ths of a teaspoon per day. I give her 1/4 tsp in the morning and 1/8 tsp at night.

She gets heartburn and those yucky, ouchy acid burps a few times a day, *but* the Fischer Price Rock 'n Play sleeper does wooooonderful things for her at night! She hardly ever cries at the reflux during the daytime now and sleeping at an angle in the Rock 'n Play keeps the acid down while she sleeps. I've wondered lately how much of the reflux bothering her was TRULY because it was painful, or if she was super sensitive because she was so miserable from not sleeping and having constant belly aches.

It frustrates me to no end that none of the three pediatricians we've seen have ever suggested that her digestion problems could be related to her reflux medications - especially now that I'm seeing there is 100% a direct correlation. I feel horrible for giving her all the medicine so early on, thinking I was helping, when I was probably just making everything worse. Uuugh  I can't even spend time thinking about it - it makes me so upset.

Tonight I'm going to skip her nighttime dose and see how she does.

She eats every 3 hours, 24 hours a day. According to our pediatrician, this is normal for a baby with reflux because eating more than that can cause distended stomach and, you guessed it, reflux flare ups. So...she's basically trained herself to eat juuuuust enough to feel not starving anymore and then she stops.

Ask me if I'm excited to have her go LONGER THAN 3 HOURS.

Go ahead. Ask me. I DARE YOU.

She's actually had a couple nights this past week where she ONLY woke up to eat. So I got to sleep in three hour blocks! Surprisingly enough, it ISN'T that refreshing. It IS more refreshing than her waking up every 45 minutes with a belly ache, though, so...I'll count my blessings there.

It's really nice to have a baby who isn't so miserable all the time during the day.

Mom used to say I would wake up and sing to myself every morning when I was a baby. Violet does that now - instead of waking up screaming. She just sits there and plays with her toes and sings. I'm excited to see more of her true personality emerge as we get further away from all this gross reflux garbage.  

That's all for now...fingers crossed that no medicine tonight will be a good thing!!

PS In case you're wondering whether I'm giving her solids yet or not - I'm not. Her ped recommended that we wait until at least six months because her digestion has been so sensitive. I have fantasies of sleeping aaaaallll night when I start giving her oatmeal cereal (rice cereal can be constipating for babies with sensitive tummies)!!  Aaah....aaaaalll niiiiight sleeeeeppp.....someday. Someday.

PPS - We also started her on Gerber's Soothe Colic Drops! They were previously sold as Bio Gaia's infant probiotic drops, but Gerber bought them out. I've been looking for them for months and didn't realize the Gerber drops were the same thing!! They're the ONLY infant probiotic that doesn't have tons of warnings about initially causing gas and abdominal pain and I really think they're helping her. ANY BABY ON REFLUX MEDICATION SHOULD TRY THESE DROPS. You're making your baby's digestion all whack by messing with their stomach acids, so help them out with a little probiotic! Seriously. Buy these for your friends. For yourself. For strangers. Just, believe me on this one. I've tried pretty much everything out there.

Ok that's all for realsies this time.

bye bye.

Hope this helps someone someday.

It's been one month today since Violet's reflux started acting up again and making life a living nightmare for the both of us. It took two weeks for me to figure out that she probably needed more medicine (she went through a HUGE growth spurt and antacids are weight sensitive). We bumped her Prevacid solutab dose up from half a pill to a FULL pill (15 mg). Her pediatrician said he would prescribe that amount to a toddler...and suggested it might be time to switch to a different medicine (antacids also lose efficacy after a while for some children).

Bumping her Prevacid dose up was HORRIBLE. She was crying constantly, had terrible gas pains, belly aches all night, wanted to eat for comfort constantly, etc...I found a blog one awful, sleepless, tear-filled night and what I read there is what has motivated me to write this blog. It was a mom with a baby who has reflux explaining their experience with antacids.

Moms: I found that cutting Violet's Prevacid into quarters helped her NOT get terrible belly aches/gas. I was giving her a quarter of a 15mg solutab every six hours. Unfortunately, six hours started to not be enough - she would spit up stomach acid that left her skin pink and hot for a half hour :( Her ped recommended giving her a whole pill broken into halves twice a day - but...that was making her really uncomfortable..so...we switched to Zantac.

Zantac (Ranitidine) tastes TERRRRRRIBLE. She would SCREAM every time I'd make her take it (three times a day. uuuuugh). She'd spit it out. She'd choke and throw it up. Also? She wasn't 100% better. She was still coughing, crying when she was spitting up, unable to sleep at night, etc...

The MAMAROO was AMAZING for a few nights! Sleeping her at that angle was fantastic while she was on the Zantac. It was a total pain to snap her in and out of it over and over again all night (she was comfort eating every couple hours), but it helped her get a little rest at least.

We switched her off the Zantac to Prilosec (Omeprazole) after only a few days. Prilosec has been great...but taking the full dose has been really hard on her. She doesn't seem to mind the taste as much. I mean, she'll grimace and fuss and try to spit it out, but at least she isn't screaming her face off. It gives her diarrhea, gas, nausea, etc (which has eliminated the Mamaroo as a sleeping option - the strap hurts her tender belly). I'm backing her off the full dose now to see if we can find a happy medium...She was prescribed 1 &1/2 tsp every day. I give her 1 tsp a day in two, half-tsp doses. I'll let you know how that's working in a few days.

I'm not sure if this post makes total sense....I'm pretty tired. But I just wanted to get it out there for someone else who might be doing a Google search in the middle of the night, frantically searching for something to help their babies (and themselves) find happier times.

Antacids give babies belly aches. Giving them in multiple small doses per day helps! Also, give them at LEAST thirty minutes before feeding your baby - no matter what!! They won't work if you don't give them time to absorb in an empty belly (except Prevacid...those little solutabs absorb almost immediately and taste like candy. *sigh* why can't ALL antacids be like that!??)

Ok. That's all.