Relief

To wrap up the whole medical saga I wanted to share about our second trip to Walter Reed this morning. William underwent a flexible sigmoidoscopy, a very quick and easy procedure to examine his hiney from the inside. I was thrilled to be allowed to stay in the exam room with him while the doctor did the scoping and was fascinated to see for myself what his little insides look like. This confirmed what has been the diagnosis all along, cow's-milk protein allergy. He took a couple of biopsies which will take some time to process, but otherwise we have no further cause for concern at this time.

Incidentally - absolutely all the staff we have encountered at WR from doctors on down have been the most knowledgeable, friendly, helpful, kind, compassionate bunch of people I have encountered anywhere in a long time - huge props to the pediatric department there.

The doctor took a lot of time to explain everything, answered all my accumulated questions from our last visit, and assured me that we can stay the course with breastfeeding and monitoring his blood levels. And even if the anemia worsens and we need to turn to formula he explained a lot of ways to approach the transition that would reduce the bottle trauma and even still include some breastfeeding.

(Have I mentioned that I think I would like to go into medicine in some form, if and when I return to the workforce?)

Anyway, this morning a huge relief from all the guessing, wondering, trial-and-error, partial information and other vagaries of the past 7 weeks. It was also a huge relief to have Don (and Amy) along on this trip.

And there's the relief that FINALLY Don has a weekend off after 12 straight days of busy, stressful work (which always leaves me with busy, stressful days home by myself with the kids). And best of all, just two more days of work after the weekend and then we will begin two and a half weeks of leave - wonderful.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming. Wishing you a happy, calm, and peaceful weekend.