Potty Time! take #2

 today addy was about to go in her diaper. i asked addy if she had to go poo in the potty. she nodded and made a grunt. took her there she held it! then went number two! then when done asked for ungodly amounts of tp.


H however has been resistant.

Potty Time!

omg so baby has been interested in the potty the last week esp the last day or so and she peed in the potty! and if she wasnt backed up she would have gone number two once too haha. you should see her she grabs tp and wipes herself too hehe. as well H has been asking to have her diaper changed more often and when addy "asks" to go on the potty we put her on too and she has gone once today too with a dry diaper at that! both my girls are growing up so proud of you two! i may just get myself a diaper free baby yet haha.

today she was on my lap as i went and grabbed a fist of tp and began wipeing so i just put her on the potty then she continues her thing for 10 min... then H wanted to go too so i put her on the big toilet while her sis played ont eh potty chair H went and got off and flushed. then addy proceded to put the lid up and try to climb on the big potty! haha then thats when she almost did number 2. no go that time as i think she had just gone.

bad fast forward when daddy gets home he goes potty, she follows him in and wants to go so we put the chair back together (it turns to a stool too) and with her diaper on she tries to sit down on it haha. we get her ready and she goes not once but twice! then H follows in to try too (her sis got a cookie for going so im sure that was her motivation) she does her thing doesnt go gets off... and addy wants to go on the big potty like her sis again haha...

some jokes.

was on the boards at truehope and happened on a post from 2009. it brought me back and i remember how confadant i was then and how well i was emotionaly. i'm close now but  my hormones are taking me for a ride haha...

but in the thread was these two jokes.
1.
It was flooding in California. As the flood waters were rising, a man was on the stoop of his house and another man in a row boat came by. The man in the row boat told the man on the stoop to get in and hed save him. The man on the stoop said, no, he had faith in God and would wait for God to save him. The flood waters kept rising and the man had to go to the second floor of his house. A man in a motor boat came by and told the man in the house to get in because he had come to rescue him. The man in the house said no thank you. He had perfect faith in God and would wait for God to save him. The flood waters kept rising. Pretty soon they were up to the mans roof and he got out on the roof. A helicopter then came by, lowered a rope and the pilot shouted down in the man in the house to climb up the rope because the helicopter had come to rescue him. The man in the house wouldnt get in. He told the pilot that he had faith in God and would wait for God to rescue him. The flood waters kept rising and the man in the house drowned. When he got to heaven, he asked God where he went wrong. He told God that he had perfect faith in God, but God had let him drown.
"What more do you want from me?" asked God. "I sent you two boats and a helicopter."

2.
A woman who is in her nature grumpy, chronically hard done by, and never content is at the beach with her young son. She nags at him not to get sand in his shoes, not to get too close to the water, not to pick up nasty dirty shells and bits of seaweed and put them in his pockest. He is playing by the edge of the water when suddenly he is swept away by a freak wave. He cant swim, and she is certain he will drown.

In that moment, she realizes that she has wasted her life being negative and unpleasant and not appreciating what she has. She drops to her knees and begs God to return her son to her, in return for which she will dedicate the rest of her life to being grateful and will never complain about anything again. Miraculously, another freak wave deposits her son on the beach in front of her, unharmed, not even wet. The woman grabs her son and hugs him - and then holds him at arms length, looks at him and frowns. God says, okay, seriously, whats with the face? I gave you your son back, didnt I? And the woman says, he had a hat.

more weird days.

hayleigh has been acting off again, but this morning woke up her chearful self so happy...

been looking into the food connection. though hayls isnt considered autistic (now) she would have been 1-2 years ago. I read up on it and female hormones have a protective effect on the brain hence why autisim occurs more in males than females.

If H had been a boy she likely would have been. but she still has traits and her body still has the same issues that go with autism, like food intolerance causing gut problems. her body *is* autistic but her mind is mostly spared.

I've noticed on her off days her tummy is bloated and her eye wanders and she is very spacy more sensitive to sounds and touch and pain. needs to be held more more cuddles etc. also ears and cheeks were red.

yesterday her tummy was distended and she barely ate and today she is herself. its happened too many times to deny the causation.

I found myeslf ont he autisim mercury mailing list a few years ago after it was mentaioned on a forum for the vitamins i take for my mood. I have no doubt their suggestions will be helpful for her but i am paralized to make the leap. im scared. some of the things i did before she went in for her assessment for autisim worked and seem to have had a direct relationship with her *growing out of it*

at 10 months old I started the vitamins myself and was breastfeeding. at ten months old she started developing!

anyway i could go on and on about the early days till now. but all i know is my instincts are often right dispite my lack of confidance that it is.

so far to date we have found a few forums dedicated to special diets or enzymes that may help her.
trying low oxalates
sara's diet
phenols.. 
more phenols 
enzymes for phenols
epsom salts this one is a big one with hayleigh. her really bad day we skipped giving her a bath. last night she not only got a bath but i slathered home made cream on her. along with rubbing her tummy with castor oil.

the first diet i found was SCD specific carboydrate diet which is actually treating for phenols by removing those foods. which is many foods.  but it was entirely daunting and would not work in my home with my meat loveing carb eating husband who honestly needs to stop eating how he does but i doubt he will. but he has some symptoms similar to hayls.so once I get them both started on no fenol enzymes we will see how it goes. we do notice a great improvement with Hayls being on the enzymes she has now from enzymedica digest gold which is another brand and a broad spectrum enzyme but phenols are covered partly in it as well. it's just more expensive.

i am still looking into more biomedical things (suppliments) so far consistantly its enzymes probiotics zinc and magnesium.

also I notice addison is also developing some of the same digestive problems.

Hayleigh and the blood sugar connection.

not entirely sure but she may be diabetic. or just not process it well.

i had been suspicious about this for a while but thought i was imagining it and being a worried mother. so i never brought it up to the dr. but her melt downs oten revolve aorund food somehow.

so i tested her with my meter. her levels were moderatly high before eating and got lower 2 hours after eating the first time i checked.

this time she had just grabbed a thing of juice but her levels were very high. i mean she had just grabbed it. tested again a few min later and it was even higher.

she often has melt downs that seam like hypo glycemia cus she is fine when she eats but maybe her blood sugar is too high and eating lowers it? i dont know.

will be monitoring for a while to see if there is anything to worry about and we will see a peid soon.
fingers crossed.

buffalo allergy?

well we knew it was possible addy may be intolerant to buffalo too as it is bovine protein as is cow milk and beef. but she hadnt reacted when i ate it like she did with beef milk and soy. so i made meatloaf with 1/4 buffalo in it the rest was pork and turkey. (one of the best ive made too!) addison loved it and had seconds even refused her veggies to have more meat... (she loves veggies.)

but about when she should have started to digest it... around midnight (late dinner) she threw it alll up. and seemed completely fine after. we will try again in a little bit to confirm. but this is getting to me i miss red meat lol. she is much better today but still off. it may be a bug, but it takes days to weeks for the protein to work out of breast milk.

fingers crossed. sigh.

Et tu Addy?

well my suspicions addy had similar tummy issues to H are confirmed in my mind. not that she had much chance to excape them with her gene pool.

she has always had weird bowel habits and she had the strangest watery/mucousy poops often green when she was newborn till she first started eating solids. (could be a sign of alergy and she had only had breast milk meaning if thats what it was, it was a very strong one) but now like H after a tummy bug she has had near constant diarrhoea. (this was nearly two months ago) and in the last 4 months or so she has stopped growing. H had stopped growing too around the time she hit about the same weight, but also in common is that addy is eating the same foods at 10 mo that h was at 16 mo and the tummy bug. H didn't grow for an entire 8 months.

also H didnt always have the dark circles under her eyes. well after age 3 mo or so it wasnt constnant (she was early and very sleepy and I was so sick so It was likely due to that)

Addy wasn't born with them but within the week of her birth especially after i ate one of the offending foods there they were... allergy shiners... sigh.

like her sister probiotics and Anti fungals help, however i think much like her sister there is something in the chemical structure in foods she just isnt digesting. and now she is ten months old getting close to a year old and not gaining weight (unless i up my supply) I think it's time to try her on digestive enzymes too. it really seems to fit the phenol / and or leutin reactions... and unlike H addy gets hyper and has trouble sleeping and gets moody, H got sleepy and passed out. Addy fits the symptoms better. so I won't hesitate this time esp since I know more now. I just feel odd giving an infant supplements.

that girl can eat like there is no tomorrow and still slow gain... something is up but since she gained so well to start it's not that obvious or even concerning (yet) and i would rather it not be.

the peid is relieved i am so proactive and found something that works for my kids. He says there is just so much they dont know about in medicine.

cry it out/ detachment parenting. and harvard study on touch.

study out of harvard highlighting babies need for touch.

"
The pair say that American childrearing practices are influenced by fears that children will grow up dependent. But they say that parents are on the wrong track: physical contact and reassurance will make children more secure and better able to form adult relationships when they finally head out on their own.
"We've stressed independence so much that it's having some very negative side effects," Miller said."

 http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/1998/04.09/ChildrenNeedTou.html

in other words having a strong bond with your child by responding to their cries actually makes them more independent and confidant later in life. ...

that being said it's really hard to know what will work for you children in how to raise them. each child is different and I firmly believe if you have to read about it in a book it's likely going against your instincts on how to raise that particular child. in my case it came down to my own confidence in myself... if you have to hide in another room to cry yourself when your child is crying (like i did often) , its not good for either of you. (though with things like PPD in play as was the case with me with my first it is necessary to recollect yourself. but then you go back in if you can handle it if not you ask for help, i had my husband and the ministry along with a family counsellor a therapist and psyc doc along with PPD support group and my public health nurse... but it is in yours and the child's best interest to not make disaster days like that become the norm) i dont think it's ok to let them cry (alone) even if nothing works (ive had those days)... they at least know you are there for them, if you are there in the room with them. there seriously were days i held and rocked both my girls while we both cried.

Attachment parenting was suggested to me by my infant development worker to help H out of her autistic traits and help her develop more typically. I believe though i had a hard time fighting the lack of instinct and attachment i had with her that all i did with attachment parenting helped her become the strong independent 3 year old she is today. she still has her days but she has come so far since. but in all honesty it was completely contrary to the kind of parent i thought i would be. I was an avid Super Nanny viewer and was all read up on tough love and trying to bend the children itno fitting into your life... until i had them myself. it just didn't seem right to go against their needs to suit myself. I read somewhere that havening a relationship with your child shouldn't be an adversarial one. they dont have another way to comunicate than to cry. if we feel we are butting heads with them the real problem is how we are reacting to the situation, and not the actual situation. I had to learn to have lower expectations on my children and  we three are much happier for it. Co sleeping baby wearing and responding to cries in due time has all helped both my girls, its a struggle to balance their needs but we're getting there... they both needed more touch than average for different reasons. and i indulged it with addy her instant banshee cries have gotten slowly to more of an average cry. =)

sleep has been a MAJOR issue around our home with Hubby not sleeping well with his snoring and  children yes even the tree year old wakes up at night and needs us to help her soothe... and its normal!

from the no cry sleep solution:

The No-Cry Sleep Solution Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night

Buy the book at Amazon: USA | Canada | UK When Your Baby Wakes Frequently To Breastfeed or Bottle-Feed If your baby is waking up every hour or two to breastfeed, bottle-feed, or locate his pacifier, you may be wondering just what it is that causes him to wake up so often. The realiity is that brief nighttime awakenings are a normal part of human sleep, regardless of age. All babies experience these. The difference with your baby, who requires nighttime care every hour or two, is that he is involving you in all his brief awakening periods. Your baby makes a “sleep association,” wherein he associates certain things with falling asleep and believes he needs these things to fall asleep. My baby, Coleton, spent much time in his early months in my arms, his little head bobbing to the tune of my computer keyboard. From the very moment he was born, he slept beside me, nursing to sleep for every nap and every bedtime. By the time I looked up, he was 12 months old, firmly and totally entrenched in a breastfeeding-to-sleep association. Your baby, like my Coleton, has learned to associate sucking (having your nipple or his bottle or pacifier in his mouth) with sleeping. I have heard a number of sleep experts refer to this as a “negative sleep association.” I certainly disagree, and so would my baby! It is probably the most positive, natural, pleasant sleep association a baby can have. The problem with this association is not the association itself, but our busy lives. If you had nothing whatsoever to do besides take care of your baby, this would be a very pleasant way to pass your days and nights until he naturally outgrew the need. After all, this is natural. You may not even see this as a problem, in which case it is not. It's all a matter of your perception and your personal needs. -emphasis mine

http://www.pantley.com/elizabeth/books/0071381392.php?nid=172&isbn=0071381392

i could not agree more that most parenting "troubles" are a matter of perception! hayls is three and still uses her sucky to sleep. almost got rid of it but wasn't able to once she got sick this winter. if she had been breastfed from the source she likely would still be doing that. and i personally dont see anything wrong with it.


anyway i have many ideas on this subject and before i start sounding judgmental as that is not my intent, and the only one i judge is myself and my thoughts on what is needed before i even had them. as ignorant as those ideas turned out to be ... lol.

stuff.

well we have been going through the ones we got at the health food store from enzymedica called Digest gold. i can say they are awsome but not perfect, bor both Dave and Hayls. i mean if we forget for a day even she is the whiney bump on a log again. with them along with the probiotics epsom salt baths or homemade cream and antifungals (natural or rx) she is such a sweety. she is my hayls.


it was hard to know what was going on with her when she was younger because she didnt communicate she was in pain she was one of those kids who had an "automatic smile" it didnt always mean she was happy and content no it was every emotion pretty much. so it was hard to know if she truly reacted to anything unless there was physical proof. i had to geuss and i was overwhelmed trying to figure it all out without any feedback from her.

I do know she made huge leaps when i started taking my potent vitamins when she was 10 mo for my Post partum depression. but she still had so far to go, and  i had no faith in my parenting. I would ask everyone in my support team (infant development family support worker social worker etc) for ideas in parenting her. i had no instincts and the ones i had were suspect to me. and i felt odd forcing myself to do the things i know i would do if i didnt have PPD like simply rocking her.

but as I learned about my needs with biomedical treatments (supplements) i learned what she needed too. much of it I dont feel comfortable doing  on my own but Im likely not to find the support i want so I am on my own. though my naturopath is willing to read up on things and give her thoughts. much of it is just as new to her as it is me. and much of this is completely foreign to my peid though he fully supports the probiotics and enzymes. as it *does* work. and he even mentioned probiotics he recommends.

but I nee dot get over my lack of confidence in myself and my convictions on things of health. (my world was shaken with the birth of addy and my husband thinks much of what i learned is suspect. in essence i don't have his full support and i desperately need it. much of what i know in my heart will help H is contraversail and i doubt he would be supportive and more than likely will let me know that im not a dr in a very condescending way and it tears me to pieces each time. i have to start over rebuilding my faith in myself and my well informed decisions. its not his intent but he may as well say "youre crazy and your opinion doesn't matter and it never will."

sigh

any way will be trying the Huston enzymes soon *maybe* just *maybe* we all can start to kick our food intolerances. I miss cheese lol!

the days are getting better.

well not fully better but on the upswing. she still complains of pain randomly but she hasnt woken up screaming from it lately so that means either the growing pains stopped for now and or the virus and or whatever else was causeing H pain is causing less of it.

Dr suggested Nike and someother kind of shoe (n cant remember the name)  to help her with her flat feet. and maybe she will some day be able to run and jump (we hope?) but its so much easier to catch up with her if she cant! lol. i do have to put the chiro on the todo list but i dont have as much faith in my current one as i did the one from edmonton. she keeps bruising her tail bone and she is so skinny there isnt much padding there something seems off. maybe i will mention it to the peid next week.

she still often spends much of the day in her own little fantasy world recounting scenes from movies and tv shows. spending some extra time each day to try and get her to respond when she is asked her name. she did for a short while but no longer does. she also assigns ownership to everything to "baby" and "dolly" when it's hers. thoguh she does say it is "mines" or "my" my often comes with a stutter so maybe thats why she doesn't use it much anymore.

the hyper activeness at night is something else.

H's digestion is getting better between the anti-fungal  meds probiotics and digestive enzymes, much less tummy pain. most days she eats at least three meals a day when before i was lucky if she ate once.

peids

well we got testing for autoimmune but likely its just more like her immune system is low and will just be one of those kids that keps getting sick. and her being so sick off and on is likely an inflamitory reaction to a virus that she picked up not likely to be contagous still but she will be picking up more bugs easily unless we can support her immune system. and the peid said to keep her home away from other kids for at least a week to give her body a break.

on the plus side she grew and gained weight since her last check. she is over 32lbs now =) thats 3 lbs!

will be working with the naturopath to work on her digestion and immune system (same difference really. 80% of the immune system is in the gut im sure ive said that before)



addy is still just over 20lbs she has dropped to the 75% tile but she is still a big chunk lol. peid isnt worried nor was i i was just curious. H had stopped growing for 8 months one year (but she was over a year old) he also said its normal for some babies just stall out in growth, if they are otherwise healthy its all good. =)


also after a mostly good day yesterday h is sleepy and defiant again today. =(

Hayls and addy plus yeast overgrowth enzymes and probiotics

just not sure what to think of what is going on.

she has always had digestive issues, from milk alergy, reflux to being intolerant to anything with iron in it other than breastmilk or she didnt also get enough breastmilk, she would get backed up as a young baby/ toddler. at 16 mo with a viral infection she then went the other way she has near constant diareah. the only things that have helped so far are antifungals, probiotics (which also help with yeast overgrowth in the gut if thats it) and digestive enzymes.

its been hard to get her to take them consistantly.

recently she has been getting sick about ever other or every third week, first rotavirus, then a flu like illness, then thrush and at the same time her whole disposition changed not that it wasnt begining to. it just got really bad. and then came the growing pains on top of the recurant random joint pain, along with rosy cheeks chronic off and on fever, refusing to eat even more so.rotten egg burps and bad gas and smelly poo and the "alergy shiners"  (it looks like we beat her when she eats something she is intolerant to but we cant figure out what it is) tounge pain from the yeast wasnt helping. with the eating, but there was a few days she bearly slept at all. we even stayed home for christmas she was so out of it and she looked like it was contagous but its been so chronic and spurradic i'm not so sure.


there are so many things it could be. and the things we used to do but slacked off on seem to help, like epsom salt baths, the enzymes, and found another probiotic she will take. and added perscription antifungals. her poop has been normal for three days. normal for a regular person. its weird...

I was just so worried looking at her curled on the couch in pain and so tired, would have been different if it was just another flu that only she got... and have known thats what it was, but with her history and my families
i really dont think thats what it is.

the oddest thing is this started the week after she was exposed to chicken pox she didn't get it but she started acting off and kept getting sick for the next two months... could have been coincidence but who knows.


Addy and i keep passing yeast back and fourth too. it hurts the ( o Y o ) lol she had the worst thrush ever after the second round of viruses in less than a month that she ever had. 80% of the immune system is in the gut... yeast is actualy a good thing in moderation and helps kill the viruses but it can overgrow esp in immature immune systems esp with lil ones with food intolerances. or in the immune compromised or the lucky gene pool i seem to be from.

ive been witnessing yeast issues my whole life between my dad and us kids. Im always trying to get it under control. it affects my mood i cant imagine how the little ones feel... i just want it gone. sigh

anyway enough about that for now.

for h we think maybe its autoimmune or has to do with food intolerances which i think is just a cause of autoimmune problems. and leads back to the unbalanced tummy... there are some enzymes made to help combat her specific problem. and many kids with diatery alergy/ intolerances are after a few months able to add the foods in their diet without a reaction! im hopeful.

It was formulated for autisim but H has the exact same symptom set they do and has a delay and earlier on would have met the criteria for high functiioning autism but no longer does. despite her many traits that sometimes creep up, they are fleeting now most times. other than her mild obsessions and her hyper-activeness and her trouble sleeping. esp if we can fix her tummy.

alison reminded me its time to take her back to the chiro. i used ot often but couldnt afford it for a while. there is something going on around her tail bone that can be affecting her. and she keeps bruising it.