Finally, Anna has stayed dry every night since mid August! She's now wearing "big girl undies" to bed and has had no accidents! She's of course excited because she was just starting to get apprehensive about friends and family knowing she wore pull-ups at overnight stays.
I guess it was finally her body's time. But let me just state right here that the body (and not the behavior) is responsible for the delay. No amount of water restriction and pottying before bedtime helped. We even carried her to the potty mid-sleep for awhile to see if that would help. We bought a urine monitor she was eager to try out (but then all
of us flaked out on that one when we realized how much sleep loss was headed our way with that), and then just suddenly I guess the Aldosterone just kicked in. We did our best to make it only as big a deal as she wanted to.
Hopefully it lasts!
She has also been struggling with some weird swallowing problems. In mid August she ate too much for dinner and threw up. Since that night she has complained of throat spasms and feeling of choking as she swallows. We got her on good old Prevacid for acid reflux, the first time in 5 years, which seems to have helped the spasms, but at one point a few weeks ago she was down to a liquid-only diet and had lost 4 pounds in 2 weeks. Right as we were preparing to walk out the door to another pedi appointment, she complained and gagged and threw up, and since her stomach was already empty, the only thing that came out was undigested hamburger meat and a large piece of onion!
She hadn't eaten that in awhile, and in fact, we wondered if it could have been some undigested food that maybe actually got stuck in her throat the night she puked a few weeks before!!
Seemed unreal but she swore that was what had been stuck in her throat when she saw it, and immediately she was able to eat more solid foods! The pedi was as stunned as we were when we got there a few minutes later. Could this have really been stuck in her esophagus?! Turns out, it happens.
Alas she's not eating everything again so there are still some issues. We have gotten smart about ways to get her nutrition in (the lack of diet variety has also led to bowel problems, which we are trying to maneuver around too), and we are setting up for a swallow test sometime soon to check for anymore obstruction since she still complains that some food makes her feel like she's choking. Just not nearly as bad, thankfully!
There's nothing more anxiety-producing than your kid not eating. I haven't had this kind of anxiety since she was a baby with reflux. Many old feelings have come back, the most important being a reminder that kids' parents are their biggest advocates. Whether it's "real" or not, it is real to her. So we are trying to get to the bottom of it. When in doubt about this "realness", Our pedi reminded me that she feels like God sits on the shoulders of parents. Only the parents know their kid best, and so when the parents tell her something's not right, she chases it down. I love her.
In the meantime I pray for guidance and patience and Anna prays for her throat to get better :)
