The greatest guessing game of all is...how to motivate Evie to eat. Someone was surprised that we actually count the number of BITES (and not ounces) that Evie takes. Well, that's because that's all she'll eat by mouth. We are averaging 5-8 bites a day, although every once in awhile she'll eat more than 20 bites for our nanny, who is definitely our MVP. The end goal is to cut down on her g-tube feeds so that she'll be hungrier. When we get clearance for having gained back all the weight she lost this winter, we will start the adventure! In the meantime, we definitely have learned some helpful tips for those for which eating is not second nature. Here are some of the finer points of eating we have learned: 1. A child with oral aversions or sensitivities can be very sensitive to where the food falls on her tongue. When we feed her with a spoon, she does fine with food on the tip of her tongue. But any food towards the middle of her tongue makes her gag. ...
While sharing our journey with Down Syndrome, we want to help other parents with our experiences, as well as spread awareness about what it means to have Down Syndrome (spoiler: it means great things!).