Annabelle and I sat down for lunch today. She’d been pretty persnickety lately regarding her eating habits… actually doing very well but NOT wanting to each foods other than “crunchies” that aren’t the most healthiest. One can not live on animal crackers and Goldfish alone!

Don’t get me wrong. I’m SUPER excited that she’s munching on them, but she used to do FABULOUS on crunching on her apples and strawberries and things, and lately she’d just been screaming until she received what she “wanted.”

And for a momma who would REALLY love to say bye-bye to a certain tube protuding from her daughter’s stomach, this wasn’t a great development.

Today at lunch though, she did MUCH better. I gave her a few options to eat, ALL healthy (Bananas, strawberries, sliced turkey, and kale–which *I* won’t even eat!)

And she did pretty good with them all!! She munched on everything, kept most of it on her plate (not an easy task for Annabelle) and just did a fabulous job.

I was sitting there eating lunch with her thinking–I really really need to get this sweet love back into feeding therapy!

To back up a minute, in February her feeding therapist left–moved to a different facility that didn’t take our insurance. We decided to take a little break and do therapy at “home” and see how it went. Mommy had always been very involved in Annabelle’s therapy, so I felt like I could take what I “learned” and apply it at home for a while. (it was a 45 minute drive each way… weekly… and that added up!)

Well, I have to say, it’s gone pretty well!! We’ve gone from crunching occassionally back in February to now eating and swallowing some very select foods. And even tries to use a fork on occassion!

But we’re at this big transition time, and Mommy is CLUELESS. We need to figure out how to start safely weaning her off of her tube feeds, and how to encourage her to chew/swallow more variety of foods, and how to DRINK–which we still lack greatly.

But— Annabelle and I LOVE her former therapist. We’d been in touch via email and she’d given me a few free ongoing tips, which was SUPER great of her. I’m very wary of starting with a new therapist for feeding–not to mention adding a therapy to our already crazy schedule since she goes to school 4x a week.

Well, a few months ago, she let me know that the facility she was at now (only 20 minutes away) was going through the process of granting a limited number of scholarships for people who could not afford feeding therapy there. I filled out the application and waited.

I hadn’t heard anything, and had figured that if I didn’t, I’d start the process after the holidays to look for a new feeding therapist, which Mommy was NOT looking forward to.

Okay, back to today. We were eating lunch and I sat there and thought– maybe I need to go ahead and find someone now. She REALLY needs it and I think we’re really close to a feeding “breakthrough” if you will, and I just don’t have the knowledge to get her there.

Then I put Annabelle down to nap.

And ten minutes later, the phone rang.

It was them letting us know that Annabelle had been granted her scholarship! EEEE!!!

I’m BEYOND thrilled. A little nervous about adding something else to our already crazy schedule, but it will be SO WORTH IT if we can get sweet little love to EAT!

Please be praying for sweet Annabelle– that she can get past this hurdle, so bye-bye to her feeding tube, and hello to “normal” food eating!!

And with this, I thought I’d share a fun video that shows how AMAZING Annabelle is doing.

While my girl can’t say full sentences….

She knows her ABC’s!!!! She also shows you how she can say everyone’s name toward the end!

W is still my favorite, though!

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3 Comments

  1. God is so good! And I remember being in that place…..crunchies only!

  2. She's so BIG!! What!? Where did the time go??? My goodness…..she is doing absolutely fabulous 🙂

  3. YAY thats so awesome!! praise God. will be praying for her eating and that she would start to love food. I have similar story which I think I have shared. but just know that there is hope, I LOVE food now but it took me a while to get there. I cannot wait to hear what progress she is going to make through this feeding therapy!

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