Keeping Baby Puke At Bay

Sylvia has decided to do this really cool thing lately where she throws up all of the breast milk she just ate!  I told Sylvain the other day, "She gulps it down like a drunk frat boy and pukes it back up like a drunk sorority girl!"  (Sorry to all of my greek friends, but I thought the comparison was fairly accurate, and darn funny.)  The scary part is, she does it when she's sleeping.  When I go to get her after a nap or in the middle of the night, she's sitting in a pool of milk and the back of her head is all crusty and gross, poor thing!  We've had two 2 AM bath sessions this week.  So yesterday morning I called the pediatrician about it and here's what she reccommended:  rice cereal. 

She said that Sylvia probably has reflux and can't keep down what she eats, so if I mix a little rice cereal with some breast milk and give her a couple teaspoons of it after she eats, it will weigh down the milk she already ate and keep it from coming back up.  As disappointed as I was to have to fool with something other than the good stuff I make on my own, I was willing to try anything to keep her from throwing up while she sleeps.  So I bought some rice cereal and one of those nifty sleeping wedges that keep babies inclined as they sleep to help with digestion.  As of yesterday afternoon at 2:00, we are puke free!  She made it through the whole evening and night time feedings without hurling it back up!  And, call me crazy, but she really seems to like the rice cereal.  I don't use much of it, but I feed it to her with a spoon and once she got the hang of it, she was all smiles and bright eyes.  I think it also helps with the gassiness, because she wasn't nearly as fussy yesterday evening as she has been in the past. 

So that was my life this week. I wish I could go back in time about eight years and say to my old self, "Get this!  In 2010, you'll spend an entire week covered in baby puke!" Then I'd stick around to watch myself faint.