Gerard and I took her for her first doctor's visit. I know that many of you may be thinking wow they waited a long time to see the doctor. Just to clarify this being a nurse who knows the pediatrician I was given instructions to bring her immediately if she seemed sick if not then take this time to bond, get to know her and her personality first. I am glad that I did wait because one of my concerns only surfaced after the first week home.
In all Anna is quite healthy. In my opinion she is quite smart in most respects. I tease that she likes heavy machinery but the truth is it appears that she has the type of mind that is very inquisitive. She likes to see how things work. The other running joke in our house is she watches our hands to see how things work, mostly the doors and the bath tub fixtures.
I will not paint a completely rosy picture here because we have had one challenge that I am doing my best to deal with. During the time that I waited for Anna to come home I worried about so many things, court, traveling, money, attachment and bonding. Quite honestly the one thing that I never worried about was her eating. I figured she would just want to eat. Actually I worried about having to set limits on what she ate and how much she ate.
When I visited with Anna in March 2009 she 8.9 kilograms or 19.5 lbs. At that time she was only 18 months old and she was just slightly under the charts for all of her measurements. When I picked up Anna in August she weighted 9.4 kilograms or 20.75 lbs please keep in mind that this was 5 months later. For her first visit she weighted 9.75 kilograms or 21.5 lbs. During this last 2 weeks I have been weighing her at home and seen her fluctuate from 21.5 lbs to as low as 19.5 lbs.
In all this time I have done my best to offer her food and mostly it has been refused. Yes refused. Now before you say 'She is crazy' This refusal of food is something that even Gerard has noticed and seen. Most of the refusing of food started to happen during the second week home. The foods that she is refusing are ones that she was eating the week prior. Getting 8 oz of fluids into her in a day has also been a struggle. Yes, I have tried a number of different cups and bottles. I do believe that we have found a system that works by @dvent, and for that I am thankful.
I feel as though I have been proactive in a scenes, mostly because she is small and I was so concerned about the lack of weight gain in the 5 months that we were apart.
So what have I done? First of all I started to read labels. This has been both a good and bad thing. I will say that I am encouraging the foods that she will eat that are high in protein. Mostly because she will eat most berries, this has been the only food that has been consistent. Can you live on blueberries?
In my search to find things that she will eat the one thing that she seems to love is Kr@ft cheese in the plastic wrapper. She can eat 3-4 slices of that stuff which I am glad she does but yuk! I am a cheese lover and have often laughed at that cheese and now I am buying the package with 100 slices in it. I have also found that she likes the strawberry pedi@sure. I about 4 ounces with a yogurt and she will drink that. Tonight I found Kefir (Russian milk/yogurt drink) at the store. To my surprise it has more protein and less fat then the pedi@sure. What the hey I figure lets try it. She drink almost 4 ounces.
I will continue to monitor her weight, intake and output. I will measure her head and height weekly and if something seems off I will have her evaluated further. I think this not eating has been something that has been a long standing problem and not so much the change in environment. I say this because now as I look back on the video that I have of her eating the person who is feeding her seems more anamated then necessary. Another interesting side note that I noticed if I speak to her in my broken Russian she eats better. So it seems that she appreciates my hard work to learn a bit of Russian. I would like to find some Russian children's music to play for her so if anyone has a site for me to find some please send it my way.
As things progress I will update this topic.
P.S. MandyJo I could not find your email address but mine is under my profile. Please email me.
School Days - November 2023
5 months ago
14 comments:
Boy does your entry sound so familiar. Colby did the same thing with food when we first came home. We had a difficult time getting most food into him, except for oatmeal, cheese, and any kind of fruit. So much has changed for these little guys that the one thing they can control is the food that they eat. I promise she won't go hungry. And I do promise, I worried constantly but after awhile I realized that making eating a struggle wasn't a good thing. I chose to pick my battles and food couldn't be one of them. Today, Colby will eat almost anything. Vegetables and some meats are still tricky but he eats very well. Having a variety of food available helped. Keep offering different foods and you'll be surprised at how her favorite foods will change.
Melissa
We brought "Teach Me Russian: a musical journey through the day, and Teach Me Russian: a musical journey through the year" with us to Russia when we adopted our then 3 year old. What a great investment. He loved it and I had learned the songs ahead of time. In fact I sang the lullabye to the judge during court. She wanted to know the Russian I knew. lol I purchased it a the local teacher supply store but it can also be purchased at Amazon. For many months we would play the music when he would get anxious. We would all sing along and he would put his ear up to the speaker. I think he thought we knew the language. Hysterical.
We are praying for ya'll here in Louisiana!
Hi Joy. We had the same problem. Our doctor recommended Carnation instant breakfast and Vika slurped it right up and asked for more. It gave her the liquid she needed and a few calories as a bonus. After that I had to relent on my aversion to juice for children and also allow her some very diluted apple juice. Now she's just fine and will drink/eat pretty much whatever I put down in front of her but that first month was a wild ride. Another thing she loved were the yogurt drinks for kids. I put them in a sippy cup and she figured it out pretty quickly. Good luck!
It is so frustrating I know, we adopted Oscar from Russia 2008, he was a tine skinny 23 month old and it was just the same. I so much wanted him to eat, but he would eat one bite and then no more......I had also seen the guck he ate at in the orphanage...it just did not make sence.Or rather it did. He could not not control, master anything in his new world, everything changed and the only thing he could control was eating or rather NOT eating. Now 8 months home he is a very good eater but it has been a long and windy road and still when he gets stressed out his first reaction will be to stop eating.
One word: Awesome! Your are the best Joy! Lil Anna is so blessed to have you has her momma!!:) I am emailing you now:)
My younger son now 9 does not eat real meat, he made this choice as a baby and has leved with it all 9 years, his 11 yr old brother lives on meat. We have used "Balance Bars" as a sorce of protien. He is my grazer. He is bio and he is a big boy. Feeding him is so hard, he eats none of the foods that kids eat. Blueberries slightly frozen has been a staple in his diet as is yogurt. We started with frozen blueberries when he his brother was teething, a sugestion from a nurse! I buy berries fresh and frozen year round. She will eat when she is hungry, we try to guide them to what is best, and fluids are a must, she sill be fine!
I have the same story with T -- on the weight but not being picky. For the most part she'll eat anything. She just doesn't gain weight. I am hoping she is just blessed with the gift of high metabolism (oh to be so lucky!!) because she does go ALL the time...
I had the parasite test done - negative. We treated her for worms. But she's basically not gained much since she's been home - and like Anna, didn't gain A THING between trips.
Congrats to you in finding what she likes. Berries are GOOD and she'll trive on the nutrients but the cheese will help with protein and fat and the pedisure etc is good too. Check out Gerber Good Starts and Boost Kids Essentials too... KE is good for immunity as the weather starts to change up here in the great north :)
Hi Joy! I will email you in a little while, but try giving her V8 Fusion.. It is packEd with veggies and fruit and J loves it. It is also high in calories and nutrients. We don't give J any baby juice or regular juice because it tends to run right through him ( of you know what I mean :)
Joy, I have no input on the eating issues...but if you will email me your address, I have a few Russian song CDs I will happily send to you. :)
I have a 2 year old who is a VERY picky eater and he loves those cheese slices in the plastic. He lives off of those, crackers, and milk. It's bad.
Very very familiar, Joy. Remember, they were eating Institutional food before and aren't used to the richness and diversity of our foods. Aidan still has some eating issues. But, you're doing the right thing in finding anything she will eat. Keep that up and don't pull your hair out and you'll all survive it. It all works out. Also, things Aidan loved last week he doesn't necessarily love this week. It changes all the time--totally normal! God Bless.
As many other posters have said, one of the issues is the fact that the food is very different than these little guys are used to when they first come home, and another is probably the control issue. Our little guy had the same issue of not gaining much between our trips which was about a 3 1/2 month wait. Turns out he had giardia which may or may not have caused the lack of much weight gain. We were told by the director of the baby home he ate minced and soft foods and were given a little list of his typical meals so we pretty much stuck with Stage 3 baby food at first. I felt like I was always keeping track of everything he ate even to the extent of calculating calories and servings of different types of foods and would really stress myself out if he wasn't eating as much as I thought he should. I tried pediasure for awhile, but also like others have said one week he couldn't get enough of one thiing, the next week, would turn his nose up so I was constantly trying different things. We tried kefir, but he didn't really like it much. Cottage cheese and yougurt he loved, I used to also make a mixture for breakfast of Gerber Rice Cereal or the Mixed Grain Gerber with whole milk, then added half a scrambled egg and sometimes half a mashed banana. He ate this for a long time and I think it helped put on weight, plus it had lots of protein. Just some "food" for thought. It does take time though.
You know, I wouldn't worry too much about it. She is so busy getting to know the routine and everything around her - it's all so new to her. She's probably too busy to eat. My kids have been home for 11 months and have only gained 1 lb each! But they are thriving and growing taller. It's great that you're offering her all different things though. She's such a cutie pie and very lucky!!!
As many have said, the eating consistently may take a little while. Everything in her life is new, and how much and what she eats are few of the things she can control.
Our son was a very picky eater and had battled lots of infections in Russia, so we were quite focused on getting him stronger and help him grow. Almost from the beginning we decided to supplement his eating with:
* Multivitamin
* Fish Oil
* Rice Protein Supplement (25 gr of protein/scoop)
* Infant Probiotic (to help replenish the good bugs in his tummy)
* Calcium and Magnesium supplement (he is dairy sensitive, so we wanted to make sure he got his calcium - we got it from Kirkman Labs.)
* 1 scoop of raw honey (for the antioxidants and to try to prevent more allergies)
It may sound like we went overboard, but in 1 year he gained 7 lb and grew 8 inches. We also gave him a lot of yogurt when he came, because he seem to like it, but then he became (or he had the sensitivity and we just found out) sensitive to casein, gluten and eggs. Now, we give him coconut milk keifur, which has tons of good stuff and bugs, but not casein. Keifur is also known as the "natural Valium", so we give it to Diego just before bedtime.
You are doing the right thing by offering many types of food. Things will get better, it may just take a little time.
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