How We Survived Reflux/Colic

As I realize that some may land here to find “answers” to dealing with colic, I thought I’d give the top things that helped the most in our situation.

(Besides Zoloft for me)

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Our son was diagnosed with infant reflux at three weeks old. He had eczema. Chronic constipation started at one month. He was identified as having milk allergy at one month. Other food allergies started showing themselves with the introduction of solid foods around four months. Once the reflux was managed with medication, he still demonstrated classic “colic” for months (crying for no apparent reason for a prolonged period at a specific time of day).

Holy shit, right? Right.

So, here’s my list:

1. I stopped doing what all the different books said I should do and did what felt right for our family for the moment. This is what I call “mothering from your own heart.” For example, I threw away the book that had told me to never let my baby sleep with me, to be careful not to overfeed the recommended ounces per bottle, and to breastfeed at all costs. I’m not saying my way is the right way. You may throw away the book that is the opposite of all that because it works for you. Do what preserves sanity for you and your family. The reason this helps you survive reflux/colic is because it gives you permission to do what helps you survive for now, rather than judging yourself for not doing things “by the book.”

This book is shit.

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2. We were blessed with an awesome pediatrician and pediatric gastro-intestinal specialist who were with us every step of the way, willing to try different approaches.

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3. PREVACID. Prevacid was a God-send. Parker was prescribed the solu-tab. He would get a half dose in the morning and a half dose 12 hours later. We had some hoops to jump through to get this covered by insurance, but it was worth it. Parker took this for about one year. We tried to take him off at six and nine months, but in both instances, the reflux came right back and he aspirated (choked on the reflux and stopped breathing for a moment). The Prevacid relieved the arching, the pain, and decreased the screaming.

Thank you, God, for Prevacid.

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4. Elecare – A “superhypoallergenic” formula. I had a prescription for this and eventually got the right person on the phone at my insurance company and got it covered by insurance. Thank goodness because otherwise, it cost $50 per can. PER CAN. Roughly $600 a month. With insurance, it cost me about $100 a month. With Elecare, my baby could finally feed without it bringing him pain. Previously, I had the defeating experience of breastfeeding my baby, only to have him scream in pain afterward and choke on reflux. I was even on an extremely strict diet (white rice, broth, apples, water, and plain white meat chicken). I was losing weight rapidly. I breastfed for three weeks and pumped for an additional week after that. By the time we gave up on it, I was relieved and my son could finally feed and be…content.

WHY is some greedy asshole making MILLIONS from selling this to desperate mothers for $50 a can???

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5. Miralax for constipation. We tried every remedy out there. Every remedy. That only brought us to eventually having to do an infant enema. Not fun for anyone, especially the baby. Miralax kept my son pooping for three years, and let me tell you, that was relief for all!

Oh yeah, the BIG bottle.

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6. Thickening the bottle, especially for the night-time bottle. This helped to keep things down. Sometimes it’s a necessary thing for reflux kiddos, even though nutritionists warn against thickening bottles (your baby won’t learn his own “fullness signals” or gain too much). My boy has never been a chubby baby, and I think that refluxing up all of your food is hard enough on a digestive system without worrying about a “fullness signal.”

For crying out loud, KEEP IT DOWN!

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7. Keeping his bed at a 45 degree angle – My husband installed a piece of wood under my son’s crib mattress that kept my boy at an angle for years. When he outgrew the reflux, we kept it like that since it helped with all the, seemingly, constant colds two year olds get. My son slept with us for the first six months of life. We created this angled spot for him with blankets to have this angle going on.

Get the damn purple sex pillow out and make it useful! (I am not saying I have one of these, but I have heard of it.)

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8. AAT – Advanced Allergy Therapeutics - This is an emerging, alternative approach to treating allergies. There are not many people who can do it, so you’d have to Google it to find someone near you or in your region. Let me start by saying that after the first treatment, my son’s eczema was mostly gone. He’s now had three different treatments and is finally able to eat most things. We still avoid things that we haven’t treated that he is allergic to. We took him to a chiropractor 40 miles away who has had training in it. I was referred by the pharmacist at the Medicine Shoppe where I used to fill his Elecare formula.

Alternative treatments need to be talked about more!!

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Anyone have other experiences to help with their child's reflux/allergy/gastro-intestinal issues? Do share! Share for the moms out there looking for a place to start!

Moms Dealing with Colic: It's Going to be OK

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If God wants you to only have one child, he gives you a baby with colic to start with. At least, this is the lesson I've learned.

Why would I ever want to go through that again? Holy shit. No thanks.

My mother swears that the second one is easy. “The second one is an angel baby!”

I will not fall for that trap.

I don’t know why I thought that I would be free from the curse of colic. When I was pregnant, I just did not prepare myself for that (although, how does anyone prepare for colic?). No, I was a highly effective, organized, all-put-together type! I would have a highly effective, organized, all-put-together baby type too! Or at least a baby who followed a schedule and loved to snuggle and sleep, sleep, sleep all the live long day as I nuzzled his soft cheek and we lay in bed together, peaceful-like, just like pictures in magazines.

Instead, I remember hanging on to my last shred of sanity, hoping and waiting for the screaming to stop because there was really nothing that could ever help it stop.

One day, my husband told me I needed to get out. There were some things we needed at Target! Yes, I would go to Target. It was a glorious idea.

I had to wait for this angry baby to fall asleep so I could go. I was still breastfeeding, and I had to make my escape at a time that my body would not be needed.

I was very, very impressed by my husband’s bravery. I didn’t want to be alone with the thing, much less be a person without lactation services. “What if he wakes while I’m gone and starts crying and wants to feed?” I asked.

“I’ll deal with it. It’s ok,” he reassured me.

Eventually, the baby fell asleep. I was scared. It was my moment, and I was just scared. I suddenly felt urgent that I had to take care of this mission as quickly as possible. It had become an errand, something that must be done, rather than a chance to get out, but I made myself do it anyway.

I drove to Target in the rain, feeling strange to be alone in my car. Alone in my car with my own music. Like the person I used to be. I felt I would never be that person again. I felt that I was changed forever. And it freaked me out.

I hurried through Target. If anyone got in my way, I wanted to frantically scream, “I have a baby at home that screams and cries!! It could happen at any minute!! I have to be there, and you are in my way, you mother fucker!” Seriously. It was temporary insanity.

I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. The whole experience totally stressed me out. Freakin’ Target.

As I neared our street, a thought struck me dumb.

There’s no way I can ever go through this again.

I started bawling. I felt like a failure. I couldn’t have another baby! I wouldn’t be able to give my child a sibling. I was not cut out for this. How do all the other mothers do this?? How do they have more than one for crying out loud??

Something was wrong with me. Perhaps I wasn’t supposed to be a mom. Perhaps my husband and I were supposed to be those travel-types for the rest of our lives.

I pulled up to the house and didn’t know what would meet me on the other side. Crying? Quiet? Peace? Chaos? My home was no longer my sanctuary I could trust to get away from the world. It was filled with constant responsibility.

I dried my eyes, grabbed my bags, and walked inside. It was quiet.

I remember I was actually able to go crawl into bed with that sleeping baby and read a book for about an hour. Being near to him and knowing he was okay, while I was still able to do something I loved was exactly what I needed.

I wish I could have told myself back then, “It’s going to be ok. You will feel yourself again, sooner than you realize. You will get more and more of these beautiful moments all the time.”

Colic does not last forever. In fact, it is merely a blip in time. A hazing. Everything gets to be a whole lot more fun eventually.

But don’t ask me if I’m having another one.

Are You Fixable?

I am participating in the memoir link-up sponsored by The Red Dress Club:



The prompt is to describe a scene from your life that would help show a person your true self.

Are You Fixable?

In a quaint and cramped Mexican restaurant, my husband and I sat across from each other, hardly knowing what to talk about.

So, we talked about our son. Our baby. Our beautiful, colicky, screaming baby.

“What do you think they’re doing right now?” my husband asked.

“Crying. They’re all crying,” I said cynically.

My husband nodded silently and took another sip of his margarita.

We had a night away on my birthday. Our son was with babysitters. We should have been partying down like our old carefree selves, but instead all we needed was a moment of silence.

We hardly knew how to speak to each other anymore without shouting at each other over the screaming of our son. I judged myself, as always, too harshly for feeling confusion and helplessness when mothering my own child. I was scared that I wouldn’t survive it. I was scared our marriage wouldn’t survive it. The emotion of it all sometimes seemed too much to bear.

I needed some reassurance from my husband. I needed to know that we were in this together. I needed to know that HE thought I was ok, even if I wasn’t so sure about myself.

“It’s been really hard,” I started.

“Yeah,” was all my husband said.

“I don’t know how I could do it without you,” I said. “Can you imagine people who are alone and have an infant?”

“No, not at all,” my husband said while shaking his head.

My husband looked up at me. He looked straight in my eyes. His eyes were filling with tears. He looked away, and then down and rubbed his face.

“It’s just been really hard,” he said, not able to speak anymore, trying to choke back the tears.

My entire insides shifted. I could not believe that my husband was so affected. It surprised me that he was showing himself to be so vulnerable. At that moment, I knew I was not alone. I knew this was all way more than just about me and my feelings. Instead of needing reassurance, I needed to reassure. My energy changed and all I yearned to do was comfort. And fix.

“Oh, honey,” I said, leaning forward, “You know what I tell myself sometimes when it all feels too hard?”

He looked at me.

I continued, “I tell myself that maybe God gave us Parker because we can handle it. You know?”

He nodded and kept looking at me.

“We CAN handle it. Just think. If Parker were given to a different family and they couldn’t handle it all – the reflux, the colic, the allergy, the crying – God knows what would happen and how someone else might handle it. But God didn’t do that. He gave him to US. Because we can handle it,” I said.

At that, my husband began openly crying and reached across the table to take my hands.

We held hands at a restaurant table for the first time in years.

Are You Cut Out to be a Mom?

Oh my goodness. Last night, I had flashbacks.

Not flashbacks in the sense of, “Whoa, I’ve done way too much acid, man.”

More like, flashbacks of when my child was an infant, and we were in the throes of dealing with reflux and colic and CONTINUOUS, angry crying.

I felt shell-shocked. Anxious. Overwhelmed. Heartbroken. At a loss. Scared. Not sure. Full of doubt. Inadequate.

I picked up my son from daycare today. He apparently has a stomach virus, causing awful diarrhea. There must be some kind of stomach cramping involved too because my son acts as though the devil has taken over his intestines.

(As a fun aside, at least my son describes things in an entertaining and truly perfect way. Puke is called “poop sneeze.” Diarrhea is called “poop puddle.”)

There was a time last night when my son was completely inconsolable. Throwing things, hitting, kicking, screaming. He was covered in his own diarrhea, and I couldn’t even get close enough, without being attacked, to do anything about it. This went on for so long (about an hour, a little longer) that I wondered if we needed to GO SOMEWHERE.

I’m thinking, “Is his appendix bursting as we stand here?!”

Eventually, we got him in the bath, with his clothes on, scared, trembling, and screaming. Once he was clean and changed, finally, all was calm. He watched a movie and ate a banana.

I stood in the kitchen, and I felt…like shit.

My nerves were on edge. I had to make dinner. I didn’t want to eat. I felt like I used to. When he was an infant.

And, there was the old fear. The fear that, I believe, every mother has sometimes.

I don’t think I am cut out for this.

And, I remembered how I used to feel that way. Low on sleep and holding an infant I couldn’t soothe. I didn’t think I was cut out for it.

I learned to tell myself, “You were meant to be Parker’s mother. You ARE cut out for it. You were cut out perfectly, for him.”

In the moments of chaos and crying and pain and doubt, you do not think you are cut out for it.

But, you are. You are cut from the same cloth, and only you can be his mother.

How Much Do You Care - About Yourself?

One of my neighbors commented on how time has flown by because my boy is already two. She said, “Gosh, it seems like yesterday that you were pregnant!” I said, “I know!” and smiled. Then, I looked down and realized that I was wearing the same “lounge” pants and hooded sweatshirt that I wore around the neighborhood when I was pregnant.

Now I don’t believe that she thought the same thing about my clothes (but if she did, I’ll beat her up), but regardless, I felt sheepish.

I have been known to schlop around the neighborhood in slippers, no bra, and sunglasses. This is not something I would have ever done before Parker. I thought it very important to wear make-up to the grocery store. Now I am outside at 10:00 am on a Sunday, pulling a wagon or supervising an obsession with the community mailboxes, looking like a loitering homeless person.

My care for what others thought around the neighborhood must have ended about 5 days after my son was born. I will never forget the details of that day.

I was dozing with Parker during a morning nap. We woke and he looked so darn cute. Look at him. Like a monkey.

I tell you now, after the flash of the camera in that very picture, Parker started crying. And screaming. And arching in pain. He wasn’t diagnosed yet, but he had The Reflux. He wouldn’t feed, and if he did, he would scream and arch in pain and choke on spit-up. My husband and I were recording his patterns of crying at the time because we weren’t sure yet what was wrong with him. I still have the journal of that day. He started crying about 11:00 am, and he DID NOT STOP until 5:00 pm.

I don’t remember where my husband was, but he came home, and I just walked. Out. Of. The. House. And. Down. The. Street. I had nowhere to go at a certain point but turn around and go back. On my way back, a different neighbor was outside and saw me. I had tears streaming down my face. I probably looked like a crazy person. Her face went all sympathetic and she said, “Oh no, are we experiencing some post partum?”

I remember standing there, shocked. I didn’t know what to say. Looking back I realize I went through some post-partum depression but I hadn’t yet dealt with that at the time. Who else wouldn’t feel absolutely depressed and insane after spending 6 hours with your own infant that you had no way of soothing, not even through breastfeeding? As if the situation couldn’t get any more awkward, she came up and hugged me. I think I sputtered out, “He’s been crying for a really long time. Something’s wrong. I have to go.”

Well, what can I say? I wear my heart on my sleeve and anyone around me probably knows how I’m feeling. When it comes down to it, I don’t care what the neighbors think. But I care what I think. And I’m tired of feeling schloppy. The incessant, horrible crying is over. The Reflux is over. It is time to pay a little more attention to myself. I’m still not going to care what I look like at the grocery store (it’s been freeing), and I might schlop around the neighborhood here and there (keep ‘em guessing), but I just need to care about myself a little more. It’s hard, but I’m going to try. Why is that so hard?

THE Reflux

My daycare provider asked me questions yesterday about the medicines that Parker was on when he was an infant. She is wondering if her own baby has reflux and/or other GI issues. Upon hearing this, I said, “Oh, I am so sorry! That is so hard. BUT, it gets better with time and the right medicine!” I am glad that I can offer a lot of tips and suggestions around medical intervention and soothing techniques because, man oh man, I have been through it. I see the tiredness and a hopeless look on her face. I see the spit up all over her shirt. I hear the baby waking up and crying and her look of, “here we go again.” Up to this point, our daycare provider has seemed like one of those Supermoms! to me. This is her third baby. She takes care of other people’s babies and toddlers. She always looks calm. She is always pleasant. Shortly after having her second baby she did highly impressive things like cart her children to the gym so she could attend a pilates class. Her house always looks spotless. My husband and I joke that she has a “look” that she gives us when she thinks we are kind of crazy, worried parents. We might drop Parker off and say, “How many times did he poop yesterday? What did it look like? We are trying a laxative and hope it is going ok.” She would calmly say that everything was normal and then give us that look. So, I was surprised to see a very different kind of look on her face yesterday. I told her that it was a difficult time with Parker when he was an infant and that I’m not planning on having another child. She said, with a deep growl in her voice, “Yes. If I had had this one first, I would never have had another child.”

Now, I don’t want this to come out wrong, but that made me feel better to hear that. It was validating. It felt like my husband and I weren’t crazy for feeling AT OUR WIT’S END. Later that night, I was writing out the names and phone numbers of doctors and suggestions for reflux, allergy, and constipation. I asked my husband, “What are other things that helped during that time with Parker’s reflux and ‘issues?’” My husband thought about this for a moment. He replied, “A supportive partner. Working together. Patience.” I smiled at that because it is so true. We were and are a team. A united front. We got through that time knowing deep down that we had each other. There was a whole lot of yelling going on-Parker would cry so constant and so loud that we would have to shout everything in order to hear each other, and sometimes it felt really freakin’ good to yell and shout everything. In spite of all the yelling and frustration, we knew we were not alone and somehow we would make it through. Well, we made it through that time, and I’m sure there will be many other times that are very trying.

(Spoiler alert - much sappiness ahead!) Now we are starting to rediscover each other again as husband and wife and not just tired parents of a crying infant. It feels good and I can’t wait for more – more fun with my husband, more fun as a family, more closeness and appreciation. I love you, Richard. You are my gorgeous god of a man and husband. “I will shout it from the top of someplace very high, my excitement!” (Luigi, Cars) or all over the Internet – I love you! I love you forever and ever – always have, always will.

p.s. surprise, hunny!