Occupational therapy! Yesterday we met with Lily's new OT, Sue, from Governor Morehead. I'm still getting a feel for her personally but professionally she is on top of her game and definitely knows what she is talking about. We have a lot of little exercises we need to do everyday, at every meal (exhausting!) and we're going to veer more towards me making smushed fruits and vegetables and away from purees slowly. Lily did so well with everything and showed so much potential for eating! She didn't gag even once :)
We also did a sensory assessment but she has to tally all that up and will most likely go over that with me Monday. We will be meeting once a week for awhile, it seems, to work on the eating and other little quirks. Such as....SLEEP. It seems like we're going to have to try sleeping training.
Yes. Training my daughter to sleep.
I was previously on the belief that as long as you were nurturing and kept your baby dry, fed, and loved that they would figure out the whole sleeping issue in due time. But, since it seems like things are getting worse and not better that it's time to look at a different angle. So I requested Richard Ferber's book at the library and soon as I read through that we will start. We might also need to do something pressure wise (Swaddle or use a heavy blanket) during the night to give her the deep pressure she craves.
Right now though we are getting up constantly during the night and rocking her back to sleep. So basically she's crying and seeing that she gets exactly what she wants.
This is going to be tough.
Sue also mentioned how much Lily likes to move, move, move and hinted towards her being hyperactive. She didn't say it in a bad way, just that we would need to show her activities to channel that activity. And that might be another reason she likes the deep pressure, because she is constantly moving around.
I tried explaining to people before how much she GOES and how it almost seems like she is "manic" in her movements. Now, I finally have someone else that sees it! She is also concerned about getting enough calories into her since she is burning through so much with all her movement. We've always been worried about that so it's nice to have someone on our side with that as well. She's told us some high calorie foods to get her to eat again, like our old friend, avocado!
Okay, need to get LB breakfast! This morning will be some yogurt, jarred fruit+oatmeal and smushed banana.
Wish us luck!
I'm glad to see the OT eval went good!
ReplyDeleteI used the Healthy Sleep Habits, Healthy Child for Cooper and he's been sleeping great for months. Although, I don't follow much of what he says about crying it out (I just can't) but his schedules and recommendations are awesome. There's a lot to be said about sleep training and most child sleep experts will say that teaching them to sleep is just as vital as teaching them to brush their teeth or any other healthy habit. A lot of things fall into place once they're sleeping good at night :)
Good luck with breakfast!