Feeding trial, day 2

Max continues to tolerate food going to his stomach well. He hasn't shown any signs of reflux-related distress, such as arching his back or making chewing motions with his mouth. Max continues to take bottle feeds quite well, although he vomited all of his noon feeding back up. At the moment, Max is getting a very slow, continuous drip into his stomach. The next step is to start compressing his feeds. Tomorrow is the first compression, with the HSC planning to reduce the time over which his daily food intake goes in to ... 22 hours. The HSC team only take gradual steps, something we appreciate after some of the more rapid changes that overtook Max at Georgetown.

The HSC team have repeatedly asked Carolyn not to be unusually gentle with Max during this feeding trial. The NJ tube has been a big relief because it effectively ended the risk that exercising or playing with Max would cause him to vomit. Back when he was getting scheduled NG feeds, we would have to treat him gingerly for an hour afterwards. Because the current NG feeds are stretched out over a long period, Max seems unlikely to vomit in response to exercise. However, having the tube hooked up all the time is kind of a drag.

Carolyn took the suggestion to heart and had a vigorous play session with Max today. She put him on his tummy to help him practice turning his head. Instead, he raised his head up to look at Carolyn. Head control is a major challenge for kids with CP, so we were very happy to see Max show signs of improvement.