A Sucky Night

It's funny what I can get excited about. Right now Jordan is passed out like she just finished a marathon, and I'm soaking wet -- all from a ~1 hour "suck training" session. She's been doing a lot of lip-licking over the last week, so we've been trying to capitalize on that. Tonight we snuggled in on the sofa and got to business. First she chewed on my thumb (ouch, she's up to 3 teeth on bottom and 2 on top), but after ~20 minutes she started sucking on it. Then it was time for the big test: Sucking on her own thumb. And she did it, for ~30 minutes!!

She's very uncoordinated, and it takes a lot of work & guidance to get her sucking instead of chewing, but she can do it. And it's a huge step up from the instant gag reflex she's had for the last few months, that was probably largely due to her RSV/colds/congestion. It takes a lot of coordination to be able to breath/suck/swallow and not choke or aspirate, so being able to suck again is definitely re-gaining lost skills.

However, we're going to have to work on the swallowing part. While she was sucking like a champion, she was drooling like a Rowe, oops, I mean a pro (same thing, Devon says). And therein lies my soaked shirt. Slobber-fest, all over me. But of course I didn't mind one bit (as most moms wouldn't).

We have a feeding clinic* coming up at the end of April**, and I can't think of anything better than letting the group watch her suck on a bottle. Maybe if we're really lucky it'll have some milk in it (instead of the water we've been practicing with lately). I've certainly learned to cherish the small things over the last year, but to me, this is no small thing. She's along way off from a dinner at Denny's, but I can still dream, right?


*A physiatrist (MD), a speech pathologist (PhD), and occupational therapist (MS), a nutritionist (MS), and a social worker, (who tries to help us "sort out" the extremely limited services that Jordan qualifies for).

**The last time we had a feeding clinic (December) she had recently quit sucking on my thumb, and I spent just about the whole hour crying about one of her only skills lost.