Blog post #6
Hamish was born exactly, exactly the same weight and length as Archie.
A healthy 8lb4oz or 3.79kg and 51cm.
But the similarities ended there.
When Hamish was born, he was placed directly on my chest and was eager to feed. His latch was not perfect which made it quite painful. I kept in mind the discomfort I had experienced when Archie was born and persevered.
My milk “came in” quickly once again – as it had after my first Caesarean giving birth to Archie – so I was thoroughly engorged at 36 hours, which made it more difficult for Hamish to latch properly and thus made breastfeeding even more painful. To make matters worse, Hamish was an absolute sparrow, taking brief feeds of only 3-5 minutes long around every 3 hours.
Once home from hospital and under the care of my midwife, Hamish gained weight at a wonderful rate, although his latch and length of feeds continued to be both small (shallow) and short.
I tried various ways to carefully reduce my milk production to allow not only myself to find comfort, but also improve Hamish’s latch.
Aloe Vera patches, special creams, ice packs, hot packs…these seemed to work best in comfort and relief.
As for Hamish, he began to squirm and scream.
Our only experience of gas and/or colic symptoms had been a three week period with Archie before he was even six weeks old.
With Hamish, we tried various holds, burping positions, drops before feeds, and yet the screaming continued day and night for four long dark months.
In the early weeks, I thankfully had my Mum visiting and she would take Hamish from 5am onwards so we could get some sleep. But soon she had to return to Australia, and Josh took over the 5am shift before work. I recommended him to use our spare bed to at least get some sleep after midnight so he could function at work during the day.
The Paediatrician was non-committal to our suggestion I manipulate my diet in the hope that if it were something passing through the breastmilk, that perhaps Hamish would finally find comfort. We decided it was worth the try all the same.
Chocolate, chocolate I missed the most.
The various holds, burping positions, and drops before feeds didn’t make any significant difference, nor did my changed diet, and thus we saw little improvement in Hamish’s pain and discomfort.
Hamish’s latch did improve in this time, and my pain and discomfort, and the constant damage to me, was finally over.
But while we were battling ridiculous exhaustion and new issues for Hamish – namely his nose, skin and fevers – we found little help for his apparent gas and began to worry about his size.
Having changed Paediatricians and felt that our concerns would be listened to, I brought up the fact he seemed so much smaller than Archie had at the same age.
The Paediatrician dismissed my query, saying that Hamish’s milestones were perfectly met and that Archie must have been obese.
But Hamish was small.
He had followed a similar trajectory as Archie had, but had fallen back at some point between 2 and 4 months, and had not picked up since.
In comparison, using measurements from 4 months to date – at almost 2 years of age -, Hamish has been 2-4kg and 5-8cm smaller than Archie.
Archie had been on or above the 75th percentile for both length and weight his entire life – often well above the 95th percentile -, and yet Hamish had gone from the 75th to the 50th and now the 25th percentile.
Clothes wise, a good example is Hamish currently wearing – at almost 2 years old – denim shorts that Archie wore from 3-9 months old.
Perhaps Archie was a tad chunky.
Every child is different, and although I had concerns Hamish may have been displaying signs of Failure To Thrive, we thought his short and sweet breastfeeds were probably to blame.
Thankfully at a little over 4 months old, Hamish’s troubles with – what had been put down to and treated as but unfortunately without success – gas finally ended.
Shortly after, Hamish’s next adventure had come, beginning to eat solids.
He had watched others eating intently from very young, so at 6 months of age we began to slowly introduce Hamish to food.
At first, the small amounts in tasting and texture testing ended up more on the floor than in his stomach, but eventually Hamish’s inquisitive nature allowed us to try more variety, if not more quantity, and without any signs of teeth, we continued on a pureed and soft diet for the majority of intake for quite some time.
Of course, Hamish’s introduction to solids had to take into consideration any foods that could cause a reaction, not so much as a concern of the gas returning, but now his poor red raw and sore eczema skin.
Introducing individual foods one at a time with 3-4 days between new foods was the general course of action, and the usual allergen suspects such as cows’ milk, soya, wheat, fish, and nuts (and products containing these) had to be given extra precaution.
Only one direct reaction between foods and Hamish’s eczema occurred – a boiled egg that Hamish ate with his hands, caused a skin reaction on his face and hands and quickly cleared after a dose of antihistamines – so we continued to increase the variety of his diet and I also reintroduced eliminated foods into my diet as time went by.
Hamish’s appetite, like anybody’s, went up and down, as did his interest in foods, changing like any child, to like and dislike the same foods from meal to meal.
I was breastfeeding Hamish alongside the steady increase in solids, and thankfully Hamish was continuing to kick goals in his milestones, up and crawling by 9 months, followed by cruising at 10, and eventually walking at just a little over 1 year old.
But still no sign of teeth.
Over time to this point, we had allowed Hamish – under full supervision as almost paranoid parents – to explore a greater variety of textures and found that he managed quite well without teeth to munch through things like pieces of raw apple and capsicum, chopped sausages and stewed meat, toast and pretzels.
Hamish’s weight still seemed low to us.
He wasn’t necessarily underweight and it never took a sudden dip on the chart, thus it was acceptable.
He also had boundless energy, continously keeping up with Archie, so our worries lessened, and our acceptance of his smaller size increased.
Early December arrived, and so did Hamish’s first teeth. These two front teeth now appeared and their conical shape lead us to the diagnosis of Ectodermal Dysplasia.
From the reading to date, there are various components of this genetic disorder that may explain Hamish’s experiences since birth, including his smaller size and obviously his eczema.
There are also pieces of the puzzle that would be interesting to know if they are connected at all, such as his small latch for breastfeeding – which has continued to today as a small open mouth – and the apparent andominal pain and discomfort from the early months that Hamish suffered.
As for Hamish’s current diet, he does remarkably well with his two teeth, tackling almost all foods, with his inquisitive nature leading the way.
He will attack a raw apple, skin and all – though we continue to supervise closely – but exposure to citrus foods/drinks has recently become triggers for Hamish’s eczema, though it appears to affect only the skin where direct physical contact is made.
So, what now?
Basically we continue as we have before, but in the hope that Hamish will sprout more teeth to assist in his eating and diet.
He is breastfeeding as per usual, and thus the nutrition from this alongside his solids intake assists in meeting his nutritional needs as well as fighting infections that he is more susceptible to.
Now that we are in the UK, we hope to find a Paediatric Dentist who specialises in children’s dentures, and can begin the long term process of firstly finding out how many – if any – more baby teeth are yet to come, and what adult teeth Hamish has waiting, and to make a plan for the future from there.
Although Hamish does – surprisingly – well with his two teeth, dentures would go a long way in assisting him to eat a full diet, and one would hope, help him to gain some weight.
And I am sure it would only add to his already gorgeous smile.
Megan xx
Keeping It Cool 