Nissen Tomorrow

Age: 10months/7months

Wt: 14lbs 9oz

Please say an extra prayer for Connor tomorrow, he will be having a nissen. We have had mixed feelings about doing the nissen but after the pH probe results, a 1oz weight gain in 2 weeks due to vomiting so much, and starting to show more developmental delays we have made the decision to go ahead.

Basically his pH probe showed that his acid was well controlled, and I believe it should be because he takes multiple medications for his reflux. It showed he has significant reflux, well duh...we knew that! :) It does make me feel a little better knowing that every time he refluxes it wasn't causing major erosion because the acid was somewhat controlled.

The weight gain or more so lack of weight gain has been a major worry for me. I know Connor has started out at 1lb 8oz and that he has come a long way but he has basically plateaued the past several months. I start to stress about brain development when he isn't growing. I would have expected once we started the microlipids and doing continuous feeds at night that he would have gained alot of weight but I was wrong. We ended up having to change his schedule during the day because 4oz at a time was just too much and he would spew everywhere, multiple times. So he now gets 3.5oz 4 times a day and still the continuous during the night.

As far as developmental delays, he had his 6 month evaluation with Bright Start last week. We got the results yesterday. Obviously Connor is going to have delays based off his actual age, but for the most part he was keeping up with his adjusted age. All of his therapist showed a significant slow down in his development once all the feeding issues started and all the different feeding tubes he had. I knew this was affecting him because he hates to spend time on his tummy, and we can't work on trying to crawl for long because he coughs, gags, and vomits almost every time...regardless how far out it has been from a feed.
After all of those things, Josh and I decided a nissen was absolutely necessary. Basically a part of his stomach will be wrapped around the lower part of the esophagus to tighten the sphincter. It is a permanent surgery, so Connor won't be able to vomit or burp unless it starts to loosen. It will also make his stomach a little smaller so we will then have volume issues, but we will cross that road when we get there :) Assuming all goes well, he will probably be in the hospital 5 days... I am hoping a little less.

I will try to update frequently while we are in the hospital.