This has been quite a week for all of us.

Liliana got her back brace last Friday. We’ve been putting her in it for 2 hours at a time and giving her breaks in between to get her accustomed to it. Once she’s acclimated to it, we can have her in the brace for longer periods of time. There is a strap that squeezes her stomach a bit, and I can’t help but think she gets very uncomfortable when we feed her.

Since we are now getting the Elecare formula from WIC, we’ve been able to consistently give it to her for her feedings. We’ve also been giving her Reglan on a regular basis; as a result of both of these, her diapers are becoming heavy with urine yet her reflux hasn’t exactly been cured.

We did go to the pediatrician this week for Liliana’s 9 month checkup. Her stats are the following:

• Weight: 13 lbs 9.4 oz | 0.21% of growth percentile based on weight-for-age.
• Height: 2′ 1.25″ | 1.94% of growth percentile based on length-for-age.
• Head Circumference: 16.73″ | 12.14% of growth percentile based on head circumference-for-age.

This means that her weight is way below what it should be and somehow, her head circumference is actually on the charts. Instead of being a curve, it looked like a steep incline. It’s really interesting considering her head circumference growth was very slow in the beginning.

Sean thinks her height is affected by her curved spine and that her spine is actually factoring into her reflux as well, since it curves in the direction of her stomach.

As if all of this weren’t enough, our new pediatrician (our other one transferred to the Children’s Hospital) wants Liliana to see a hematologist to check out her high platelet count just to make sure that it won’t be a problem for her. He said that a high platelet count can cause clotting in places she doesn’t need it, so that’s another appointment I’ll have to make along with all the follow-up appointments I’ve been procrastinating on scheduling.

Liliana’s been doing this new thing this week where she’ll snort through her nose real fast as a way of laughing. It’s really fun to watch because sometimes she’ll scrunch her eyes at the same time. Another oddity: she laughed while hanging out with the cats in her tummy time/sitting area. Nothing was happening at all, but I guess she became so happy that she laughed out loud. The only time she laughs is when we blow on her stomach.

Here are two pictures this week:

Snort snort

A puzzled look for no reason

It’s time to feed the baby and get to work!