Remembering Reflux

My dear friend recently gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Her beautiful baby girl has reflux. Because her pain and trauma hits so close to home, and because I never expounded upon the experience that we had with it, I am going to remember it now for my own sake and as a support to others that have experienced this cruel, harsh and undeserved sentence after the birth of a child.

It started after the second week of Stella's life. The screaming. The crying. People said it was normal. Others said it was not. People said it would stop after 6 weeks; 8 weeks; 3 months. The pediatrician listened and gave us sympathetic looks but really did nothing. When people asked how things were going, we nervously tried to be honest without being too whoa-as-me. And then the barrage of suggestions: "Did you try Gripe Water?" "Maybe you hold her too much". Then we just got sick of talking about it. What was the point? It was clear that other couples with babies less than three months old were enjoying Netflix movies at night and were eating dinner sitting down. They were not going through this. They were not gearing up all day for 5pm to start, when the baby would literally scream for the next 5-7hrs. They did not have days filled with painful gas and hiccups. They weren't forced to keep their baby sleeping upright ALL day and most of the night.

It started without warning. Things suddenly shifted from having a peaceful quiet newborn that slept in a baby hammock to having a panicky situation of passing her back and forth to each other as she screamed her loudest and tested our resolve. We walked up and down the street for hours in the middle of the balmy night, we rocked, we changed from sling to Moby to arms and to sling again. We laid her on the changing table and massaged her belly - sometimes that would quiet her for a few minutes. A few minutes became Heaven to us. But it would never last. We literally always had to be on the move. When she'd finally go to sleep later in the night, she would only sleep upright in the Moby, for when we laid her down it would start all over again. We took turns sleeping with her that way until it got so late in the night that we could lay her down in the bed with us and she would give into exhaustion. But many full nights were spent upright in the Moby, too.

And now, all her naps are spent upright in the Moby. ALL of them.

What was the problem? It was "colic". It was silent reflux. It was most likely underdeveloped intestines and "such" (pretty common in babies - they call it "colic"), and it all causes lots of stomach discomfort - gas, reflux, etc. She never had a diagnosis (we were never pushed to get one). In case it was allergies, I went wheat, soy, dairy and nut free for 3 months. I had done it before I got pregnant, but I wasn't nursing at the time. I wasn't sleep deprived at the time. While it sounds easy enough to just get up and cook chicken and broccoli, it's not easy to get up and make anything when you're baby won't stop crying and you're completely fried when she's not.

What worked? Nothing stopped the crying except for small distractions a couple of minutes at a time. A dropper of Gripe Water or Mylicon, a finger to suck on, eventually the pacifier would buy us a few minutes, a soothing CD would help calm our nerves while we wildly swayed her from side to side in the Moby. We literally could not stop moving. She would not let us sit down. AT ALL. One of us would make dinner while the other paced with the baby, and then we would take turns eating, or one of us would feed the other as we paced. As long as we kept moving. That's what helped.

Sadness, stress and worry is what I felt. When Erik would take her, I would fervently search the net for answers about colic, reflux and gas. I'd read message boards where people called it "the witching hour". I knew I wasn't the only one out there. Dr. Sears has chapters devoted in his books to comforting and parenting this kind of baby. But none of it actually helped the baby - it just made us realize we weren't insane and that it wasn't our fault. We still didn't know anyone else going through it though. Literally no one understood or could help, and we were so busy dealing with it that we didn't know how to ask for help.

Oh, the worry I had. I was a first-time mom! Nothing could have prepared me for that. She would grimace and straighten her legs and body like an arrow. She would scream so much that she'd get hoarse, and she'd cough and choke. I was supposed to protect her and I felt helpless. I felt robbed that I was not getting to bond with her in a sweet and intimate way. Instead, I was trying to control myself from losing it altogether. When she would stop screaming, I would begin to sob. Listening to that much crying and not sleeping at all was a recipe for complete havoc on the soul.

I went back to look at my posts from this period and I can see that I was politely avoiding the subject - trying not to complain. We were getting more judgment than support at the time, so I remember trying to keep the complaining to a minimum - use the blog to report milestones and happy things, I told myself. I didn't want the trauma of it to be the only thing about which I talked. But now I'm talking about it. I want my friend to know that I understand how insanely hard it is (though I don't know what it's like to also have a toddler, and her baby's reflux is MUCH worse). I want her to know that it prevents you from being the "kind of mom" you would want to be (one that's 100%), but that it's ok - things get better.The kind of mom you are to that baby at that time is exactly what you have to be. Say what you need to say, think what you need to think in order to get through it. I'm not proud of the thoughts I had or the things I said outloud when I spent hours getting her to sleep only to have my phone wake her up and have it start all over. I'd pass the baby off and go into the garage and yell into a towel (or other outlets). Had my friends actually seen how I was behaving, they would have been worried. Should they have been? Yes and no. "Yes" because I could have used more help. But "no" because yelling into a towel and throwing pacifiers are very healthy ways to relieve frustration. If you don't let it out somehow and somewhere, you'll either deal with it in therapy forever or spend your life regretting something worse.

I'm not saying anything that my friend hasn't heard before. But for my own records and to support her and others, I needed to recount this time. It's anxiety-producing. It's nothing but hard in every way. I was lucky that it ended. When I was beginning to lose hope, there was a magical turn-around at 3 months. Oh glorious 3 months. Many things did not change but the crying stopped. That doesn't happen for everyone, but it will stop at some point. Until it does, I can tell you that everyday makes you better at it and you get stronger from it. It's cliche but it's true. You almost become a pro at crisis management.

If this is happening to you, I recommend talking about it and reaching out as much as possible. Don't suffer through it alone and don't be self conscious about it (as I was). If you keep talking about it, you will eventually come across others that are experiencing the same thing, and while they may not solve your situation, it will help just to have some understanding from someone. And if this is happening to you: Good luck - you WILL survive it. Take it one hour at a time. And to my friend who's situation is much worse than mine was: You are doing an amazing job. Your kids may never thank you for being so strong during this time, but getting through it is making you an even more amazing mom than you were before (hard to believe!), even though you think it's the opposite.

And while you can't prepare for it now, I would just say to be aware that if you have a baby like this, it seems that they tend to stay a "high-need" baby. Parenting them can be more of a challenge, but apparently their high needs are all with purpose - they will amaze you. And you will amaze yourself.