New Baby O

Our new Baby O arrived about a month early back in October. He is a wonderful son. His sister O loves him so much. 

Nevertheless, new O has been having a hard time gaining weight. He hasn’t had the best latch since birth, probably due to the fact he was 36 weeks combined with a weeks worth of jaundice and billi light therapy and daily heel pricks. 

About two weeks ago we had a frenectomy for his upper lip and tongue performed. After that he started to show more promise nursing, yet it wasn’t good enough for our pediatrician, who didn’t put a lot of stock into a tongue and lip tie being an issue preventing breastfeeding. So we then had to feed him via tube and syringe while he was at the breast. He gained weight but not consistently. 

Now we find ourselves 6 days into an undefined length of stay in the hospital where they have given new O an NG feeding tube where they give him 18 oz a day via the tube. 

While here in the hospital they have said that he has had low sodium and potassium and water on his kidney as well as low vitamin D. He has also been a lot sleepier and a lot more irritable when awake. 

The doctored say that they are mainly still observing everything so they can get a diagnosis together as to why he gains weight so poorly. As of yesterday he had gained only 3-4 oz his entire hospital stay. 

Yesterday my wife noticed something. That after each feed through the tube they were rousing it out into his belly with about a teaspoon of water. A nurse even tried to flush the bag and tube into baby O’s stomach with over 15 ml of water. If you research infants and water you will quickly learn that infants under the age of 6 months really should never be then water. It dilutes their sodium and potassium levels, causes irritability, low body temperature, and decreases the body’s ability to absorb nutrients from the breast milk or even formula. 

Sounds like our great nurses are causing more of the problem than they are helping. We are in a pediatric acute care ward, that would stand to reason that these nurses would be versed in the fact you don’t give infants water. 

Last night, when O’s Mommy discovered this she requested to speak to the resident that was here. For some reason he never made it to our room. Now we are waiting for the “team” that is treating our child to make their rounds so we can talk with them about our concerns.