Pyloric Stenosis

So we finally got settled in after an interesting week. As I posted before, Sawyer was throwing up a LOT starting the Thursday before and all weekend, and by Monday it was out of control.  We went to the doctor at about 4:30 Monday and he said that it could be either the flu or a condition called pyloric stenosis that shows up at about that time in life (6 weeks old).  He said it is fairly common, but way more common in first borns and males (especially first born males like Sawyer).  He told us to feed him 5mL of Pedialyte every 5 minutes to try to get him hydrated, then start to move up the dosage. Since he had wet diapers, it showed that he wasnt too dehydrated yet. Well we tried the Pedialyte and it worked for about an hour. We moved up the dosage a big and BLECH. He started throwing up all over the place again.  Andy was worried so he called the on-call doctor which happened to be Dr. Knowles, Sawyer's pediatrician.  He told her what was going on and she said since he is so small to take him to Mary Bridge Children's Hospital's ER. We wait awhile, we weigh him (10 lbs, 7 oz....he was 11 lbs on thursday). He gets to his room and puts on a giant gown.  They try to draw blood but since he is so small and dehydrated, they have to poke him 5 times. They would get a vein, a drop of blood would come out, then it would close up.  They also had to stick a catheter in him to get a urine sample which was sad too.  They do an ultrasound, and find that it definitely was pyloric stenosis.  It is when they pyloris, a muscle at the bottom of your stomach and beginning of intestines is overdeveloped so food cant leave your stomach, it is blocked.  They said it is a minor surgery, and they do many of them, but it is still surgery on an infant so they know it is scary for us. They have to go in and cut and stretch the muscle out.  The next day at around 11:00 he went in for about 40 minutes and had a successful surgery.  He then stayed in the hospital until thursday around noon.  It was hard to get him to eat again, we had to do pedialyte, then his regular formula, then he threw that up, then we mixed pedialyte with an easier to digest formula, and work up from there.  She said his stomach was so stretched out and swollen that it matched someone who had the condition for a couple weeks, not just been throwing up for about 5 days which is why it was harder to get him to eat after.  Anyways, he is now eating about as much as he did before the surgery, and though he cries a lot more than he did before, we think he is just uncomfortable and everything will be back to normal soon.

His giant hospital gown

He was so hungry :(

His little bed

He was hooked up to the chest sensors, a glowy toe light, and an IV