The day started out on a low note, but!!! Back from the brink =) Bean earned only 3 out of 5 stickers for slow eating at breakfast but ate a great lunch. I got to sit in on dinner and 'do the routine' w/coaching. She not only got all 5 stickers but she ate BONUS bites of the most difficult food - hot dog. AND - we learned that she met her food calorie goal yesterday!!! We already knew about
meeting the liquid goal but the food goal was a bonus. Today she is on track for the liquid goal, might even exceed it by a few mLs and I think she is close to the food calorie goal. (Won't know until tomorrow.) WAHOOO!!!!! I must say, I AM IMPRESSED. I plan to write more on the blog tonight b/c what I just said was only half of our day =) We've been busy!
For some reason, when given the choice at breakfast of which food to finish, Colleen picked the most chewable/most difficult food. She soldiered her way through about 3 bites of pancakes before the doctor advised her to change her plan. Together they agreed that the smoothest food would be good to go back to. However, by that point it was too late...she didn't finish a food nor did she finish her milk. (In case I haven't explained it well enough - usually the tray contains a chewable and 2 smooth foods, one that is like a pureed veggie or fruit w/some texture to it and then a totally smooth food. Her goal is to eat 5 bites of each thing, drink all the milk and finish one food.) She didn't have too much anxiety at all at the beginning of the meal, so I was sort of shocked that she didn't finish stuff and she just plain ran out of time! But why did she pick the pancake?? We can make guesses but it doesn't really matter...
Lunch was outstanding and she was awarded all of her stickers! Dinner - she was very excited to have me serve her and be in the room w/her! The doctor stayed in the room to coach me. I did really well presenting the spoon to motivate her to swallow and get ready for the next bite. I need to work on offering specific praise (Good swallowing! I like how fast you chewed that! and not just Nice work! Good job!) and I also need to work on staying silent when she starts to goof around. She tried to argue w/me about something or negotiate something and my mouth opened to respond but I needed to be reminded that no response is the best response. I was extremely proud of Colleen at dinner b/c she earned all of her stickers w/5 minutes to spare! Then she chose bonus bites of the chewable food to earn an extra sticker! She ate the 3 bites of hot dog rather quickly and we danced in the side room!! Once again she emptied two 12 oz cups of water during the course of the day, in addition to almost 24 oz of milk, which means this is the 2nd day in a row that she will receive NO TUBE FEEDING OF ANY KIND!!!!
On to the other stuff...this afternoon the hospital hosted a 'state fair' of their own. The Fairest of the Fair was in attendance, there were jugglers, clowns, games run by local arena pro football players, enlisted Navy men and women of various ranks, dogs dressed/dyed to look like farm animals, etc...Popcorn, corn dogs, corn on the cob and cream puffs were offered, blue ribbons and goodie bags for all! "What's a goodie? And why they give us a bag of it?" My sweet girl was a little put off by the crowds so we didn't stay too long. Afterwards the Fairest of the Fair made some rounds, visited our room and autographed a picture for us! I have many pictures but I will probably share them later...if you think that's all we packed into this day, you'd be wrong friends! This morning we saw cousins who are also here for a few minutes, we colored in the art room, we had dinner w/family from LaCrosse (got to meet the newest member of our family!) and mailed some letters! Tonight Moses and Dave are staying at a campground nearby and we will hopefully see them for breakfast and the rest of the day tomorrow. We are so very blessed to be here and to be making tons of progress, but not only that, we are blessed by many people who are praying and doing things for Dave while I am gone. We feel so loved by God, by family and friends...thank you!!
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