An Honest Talk About Reflux

First of all, I HATE REFLUX. Corina has been dealing with reflux probably since birth, but it really started to increase in intensity (and so got diagnosed at reflux) between 3 and 4 months of age. She is the happiest baby unless her reflux is acting up. Sadly the amount of time that her reflux is acting has become a majority of the time.

Her currently management plan is:
- Prevacid - 1/2 a pill twice a day
- nectar thickened bottles
- staying upright as much as possible (which is hard because since she knows she can "crawl" around, that's what she wants to do)
- changing her eating schedule from 4 60z bottles to 5 or 6 3-4 oz bottles (not sure how this will work since she set her own eating schedule, and I'm not sure she'll be happy with us messing with it)

If changing her eating schedule doesn't work we will most likely be going to the GI doctor.

I am exhausted! I am worn out more mentally and emotionally than physically since I do get to sleep at night. I realized how much so when in the past week or so I really can't even handle the small "I need my diaper changed" type of cries. Thankfully she does not scream all day, every day. However, she will scream and cry out of pain in the late afternoon/evening every day, and about once a week to ten days she'll have one awful day where she screams the majority of the day.

Eric and I have commented to each other how we can see sleep training issues possibly coming up in the future. She is beginning to associate being put in bed with pain because her reflux always flares in bed no matter the precautions we've done beforehand. So this also means that while she can self-sooth when she's feeling good, when she's not we rock her completely to sleep before putting her in bed. None of this is unfixable if it truly becomes an issue, but we'll just have to figure out how to deal with it.

I'm so glad school has started for Lukas because there are so many times that I just feel guilty about completely ignoring him to take care of Corina. He doesn't get it (and I don't expect him to). All he knows is Corina is crying...again. I'm so glad he loves her so much because if he didn't he could easily start to resent her due to how much of my attention she takes and how much she cries.

I am grateful that aside from the reflux, she is the happiest and most laid back baby in the world. She is adorable, smart, and utterly amazing. I cannot wait to see where her life will take her! So for now, lets just try to beat this horrible thing called reflux.