Updates!

Well, life has been fun! We've had lots of action in the last month. The story, post-birth to present, in a nut-shell:

John Morgan eats all the time...literally! He cries whenever he's taken away from the food source. If he sleeps an hour at a time, we consider ourselves lucky. I take him to the pediatrician 4 times in 3 weeks. He tells me I'm just a new mom and that all babies cry...thanks Doc. Thursday morning last week I change a poopy diaper, only to discover that there's blood in the diaper! My heart sinks and the pessimist in me starts thinking the worst. I call my ped's office first thing and we have an appointment for that afternoon. By noon he's made 3 more bloody diapers. I call the triage nurse at Children's Hospital, who tells me to bring him to the ER right away.

~At this point, can I just say how grateful I am that we live in the place we do, where we have access to a specialty children's hospital, and it's only an hour away~

We take him to the ER where he's seen by two different doctors, who decide to admit him overnight and they start the ball rolling on all the tests. We're given a list as long as your arm of the things that could be wrong and all of the surgeries that could be needed to fix them. Just what I'm wanting to hear...not.

~Here, another thing I'm so grateful for: Priesthood Blessings! Through a friend of a friend (thanks JoDell) we were able to have a wonderful man by the name of Matt come and help Joe-Z give John Morgan a blessing. It brought a wonderful Spirit to the room and a much needed peace to my heart and mind.~

When all is said and done, we've been seen by the ER docs, the General Pediatrician Team and had been handed over to the Gastrointestinal Team. The GI specialist hands him a diagnosis of guess what folks...a cow's milk protein allergy. Yep, that's right. The same thing that Levi had that wreaked havoc on us a year and a half ago, the same thing that I asked not once, but twice if my pediatrician thought could be the problem and was reassured that "sometimes babies just cry".

So, basically, his body was rejecting the protein and released acid to fight it off. This was burning his intestinal tract which was causing all the discomfort which made him want to eat all the time to comfort his little tummy, which only made it worse. This, in turn, caused all the crying for baby, which caused the crying for mommy and daddy, lol. The treatment...Nutramigen, a special formula where the proteins are broken down into a different shape so that he'll be able to accept them.

How much better could it have turned out? We were so incredibly blessed. He's a happy baby now. He eats 5 ounces of formula and then wants to hang out for about an hour, crying free! Then he'll sleep for about an hour and repeat the process (all though at night, sometimes he'll skip the staying awake part and let us get 2 hours of sleep at a time!!). He's still only sleeping in the swing or car seat, but we're happy for there to be sleeping at all!

One other great thing that came out of all this: we found out that there is "about a 100 percent chance that your future children will have this allergy, so start them on the formula from the beginning, and you'll save yourselves all this trouble." Thanks Dr. Aurora...we love you.

Now, onto bigger and better things. John Morgan was blessed this past Sunday, and it was BEAUTIFUL. I am so grateful for the priesthood and that my wonderful husband lives worthy to use it. What a special gift, a blessing right from his Father in Heaven to him, through the hands of his father here on earth. With Levi, the underlying theme was definitely love...that he would be able to love those around him and be an example through that love. For John Morgan, almost every blessing focused on how faithful he would be and how he would treasure the gospel. We figure with a foundation like that, everything else should fall right into place!

A special note of thanks to those who participated in the blessing: the Bishopric, our Home Teachers and our good friend John!

One other really great thing that has happened lately is just watching Levi love his brother. He has been so wonderful about having another member of the family here. The first thing he does in the morning and last thing he does at night is kiss his brother. Any time John Morgan cries, Levi is by his side and usually loudly alerting me ("Dadadaaaaaaaaaaa") that my attention is needed, lol. He loves to "share" his toys with him, and always wants to lay with him under his play mat or on his blanket. It is such a privilege to be the mother of such wonderful boys.

Now just more pictures of cute John Morgan (who still looks just like Levi)...who turned 1 month old yesterday.