Have we been dreaming?

Well if I didn't live the last 2 months of my life, I wouldn't believe everything that has happened to us. Hence the lack of blogging and updating. I think I can safely say that the last two months have been the happiest, yet the most stressful at the same time. We (or maybe just me) have been on an emotional rollercoaster and are so ready to hop off!

I'll begin in January when it all started and Lyndee was about 4 weeks old. When I say "it," I mean the throwup explosions. We are talking projectile here, all over the place! As the weeks went on the throwing up just continually got worse. I quickly called the doctor when our baby no longer acted like our baby. Here is the quick list of how the elimination process went..


1st- Switch from cow milk based formula to soy milk. We soon discovered that there was no change, and that it was actually getting worse.


2nd- Try a mild reflux medication, zantac. Feed sitting up and burp after every ounce. At this point she couldn't even sleep flat in her crib because the throw up would clog her airway. Imagine waking up to your baby coughing and gasping for air, then running into her room seeing her covered in throw up. It was awful!


3rd- Try a stronger medication, prevacid. She was throwing up after every feeding ( which was only 2 ounces). When I say throwing up I mean launching throw up a few feet, and I'm not exaggerating. So you can imagine how well she kept down this medicine. She was tagging every item of clothing we and she owned. Not to mention couches, carpet and grandpas and grandmas.

Last- January 29th soon became one of the scariest days we would experience. Throughout the day she continued to throw up every meal, but when she would throw up it was brown. She then threw up when we weren't feeding her. She became less responsive and dehydrated. Travis and I decided that we were so done with this and concerned for her health, so we took her to Primary Children's ER. They hydrated her and decided to keep her overnight because she couldn't keep anything down. The doctor told us that there potentially was a blockage, and they could perform an ultrasound the next morning. She continued to throw up through the night, without being fed anything. The next morning she had an ultrasound to look for a blockage. We could see on the ultrasound that her little belly was completely full and I thought, how could that be? The radiologist then stuck a NG tube up her nose and down her throat (I almost lost it again at this point), and drained 8 oz of fluid off of her stomach. Then the radiologist diagnosed her with pyloric stenosis, which basically means that the valve that connects her stomach to her small intestine was completely closed off. The only way to solve the problem was to have surgery, which involved cutting the muscle ring that surrounds the valve and allowing it to open up. We found out that in babies who experience this, it usually begins to close off at 2-8 weeks of age, which fit our story perfectly. No wonder all her food was coming up, all the time! She was much more content after he drained the fluid, but she had to wait without food a few hours before surgery and 8 hours after.


It made me so nervous to let the surgeon take my sweet baby away, but both Travis and I knew that this was the answer to our weeks worth of prayers. It was so hard for me to watch Lyndee suffer through these weeks wondering if there was something I was doing wrong. But the end of this whole experience at Primary Children's was fabulous, I loved how attentive the doctors and nurses were to her needs. It has been so neat to watch her progress since the surgery. She has made a complete turn around, eating and loving it and smiling like crazy. Through this experience I learned something I thought I already knew, how amazingly strong the spirit that was sent to me really is. She endured this little bump in her path so well and is already showing us what she is really made of!


February began with the removal of my gallbladder. I have had pain in my right upper chest since I had Lyndee. It started waking me up in the middle of the night, and crumbling me with pain during the day. I felt like I had either broken a rib or was dying of something! I couldn't take anymore and mentioned it to my doctor's PA who checked me out and recommended I have an ultrasound. That led to surgery a few days later. Thankfully we stayed at my parents house and my mom took care of Lyndee at night, and also nursed me back to health. Travis came in the evenings after work to help out as well. It was really hard for me to not be able to take care of my baby, but with everyone's help we made it work. We can gladly say we are all healthy right now and looking forward to spring and enjoying our sweet girl! She is looking more and more like her dad everyday.

This was the morning of the day we took her to the ER. We had surrendered to the point of jokingly wearing a poncho when we fed her, because before we knew it we were wearing it!



Look how tiny she is! Luckily the weeks following this have been full of lots of food and gaining weight.