Ok, so I don’t blog a lot. But life has been hectic. I have a 10-week old daughter now. And she’s not been a happy camper.
She has made her father and I manic-depressive about our parenting skills. LOL Or rather our ability to calm and soothe an infant.
At 3 weeks old, Emily was put on Zantac for acid reflux. She was arching her back, having wet, painful burps and wasn’t sleeping well. After a couple days on Zantac, she was a different baby. She would gently fall asleep in my arms, instead of us having to walk, bop, pat and shhhhh all at the same time.
Well, three weeks ago, she started it again. Except it didn’t click in my head that it could be the acid relux acting up. After all, she was on meds for it. Right??? And meds are supposed to work. Right??
Wrong. Apparently Zantac can stop working for some. And it’s just not in infants, either. It’s also in adults. As a matter of fact, any acid reducer/heartburn relief medication can suddenly stop working and you try another “brand”. Go figure.
Well, two weeks ago, she started arching her back at feedings. And she started spitting up more and having wet, painful burps again. I thought it was an allergy/sensitivity to dairy. So, I cut it all out. Everything. No butter, sour cream, cream cheese, milk, yogurt, nothing with casein or whey in the ingredients. It’s pretty extreme. BUT, there are lots of substitutes available now. Not a huge deal. They’re not as tasty, but I’m dealing with it. She finally nursed again after eating once in 28 hours and was doing well. This was after a visit to the ER. If ever your child is sick and you go to the ER, they immediately become better when you walk in the door. LOL And you’re out your co-pay.
Then 6 days later, she’s doing it again. This time, I was a little smarter and got her to nurse – but I felt that tricking her into eating (by making her go to sleep and “dream feed”) was not a healthy habit to get into.
Off to the doctor for the 4th time that week and we got a prescription to Prevacid. From my research, it is a low dose, but we got it.
We are on day 4 of the new med. And she is finally acting like a 2 1/2-month old should. She can sit still without crying. She can play with toys. She’s noticing her hands and grabbing things to put them in her mouth. You see, before, she was in too much pain to be bothered with it. She was not happy at all. And neither was Mommy. I would spend hours trying to get her to sleep. And each minute I was trying to get her to go to sleep, I came up with a new theory as to what the problem was…the chocolate dairy-free, soy-free ice cream I ate, the orange juice I drank, the vitamins I took, my period starting, the garlic I added to the hamburger, the onion I put on the hamburger, did I eat something with milk in it, am I stressed, am I overfeeding her, is her diaper wet, is she overtired, is she just colic… It just goes on and on and on.
And the doctors didn’t make me feel any better about it. “Typically, mother’s milk is best, but maybe she can’t tolerate yours.”, “The Zantac should be working. It’s a great medication and she’s on a good dose.”, “Maybe it was just a tummy bug.” So, after spending $230 in co-pays in one-week, I decided to play dumb. I didn’t say that I knew Zantac could stop working. I just told them that she responded to the med in the beginning and the symptoms are back. I even went on to say that I was thinking the drug store didn’t give us the proper prescription this month. LOL At first, they suggested increasing the Zantac dose. And I just said “Do you really think that’s best?” And he said that no, he thought switching medications would be best. YIPEE! I had suggested the switch on the first doctor visit. I could’ve saved myself $210!
So, here we are – Day 4. She’s napping regularly. She feeds and falls asleep easily. She’s actually hungry. When she cries, she is crying for boredom, hunger or a wet diaper (she has pretty strong opinions about a wet diaper)! There is no fussing. And she’s smiling. Which is the best part of the whole thing. Because she has an awesome smile. And she’s cooing now. It’s so precious to hear that sound. 
