I really should stop whining!

Hi,

After my whinefest about no progress yesterday, Ethan actually made progress today! HooHa! We will take any forward progress we can get.

I should also acknowledge the following small steps as progress:

He actually did take a few sips, albeit unwillingly, of the strawberry banana smoothie yesterday, so I really should count that as progress.

He is also able to have more than one food item in front of him at a time here. Back at home he would launch an offending food into orbit if we dared place more than one food item in front of him at a time. At each feeding session, he has a smoothie, a yogurt, 5 goldfish and 5 pretzels in front of him at one time.

Today at lunch, the feeders presented his yogurt cup as usual, but they had stirred a spoonful of strawberry yogurt into his container of beloved vanilla yogurt. Ethan took a look inside the container, 'read' the label, took another puzzled look into the container and 'read' the label again. Needless to say, he started with the other foods.

By the end of lunch, he had fought the new yogurt mixture, spit several times, but was able to eat the entire container when the feeders 'force' fed him using the finger in the mouth maneuver.

At snack time he took the new yogurt mixture more easily and allowed the feeder to 'hand over hand' feed him, meaning his hand and the feeders were on the spoon.

At dinner time he took several bites on his own before he back-tracked a bit and started to fight the new yogurt mixture. He eventually took most of the container in a combination of self feeding, hand over hand, and force feeding.

This may seem like a small thing, but it really was big in the realm of Ethan's feeding issues. The plan is to move to a 50-50 ratio of strawberry to vanilla yogurt then go all strawberry and then try something non-yogurt, perhaps sweet potatoes.

New drinks are on hold for now because sips through a straw are too hard to verify and measure and Ethan is not yet able to drink out of an open cup. Ethan will work hard on the open cup drinking in therapy so we still have a goal of getting him to accept whole milk with Carnation Instant Breakfast added as a thickening agent.

Behaviors ran amok today...again. Many time outs in the playroom for kicking. At dinner, in the crowded RMH dining room, Ethan launched his pretzel bag into orbit where it came to rest on someone's lap. He also launched a shoe into orbit (thankfully it didn't hit anyone) and he launched a sock into orbit which actually landed right in someone's dinner plate. Lovely.

I'd strip him naked before entering the dining room if I thought he wouldn't tinkle on someone!

Wish us luck!
Molly & Ethan