One Month Check Up (A Little Late) – January 7, 2008

Since Madeline was one month old during the holidays, it was impossible to get her an appointment. We took her in on January 7th for her one month check up. Madeline had been fussy all morning, as she has been for the past few weeks. She cried at the doctor’s office for an hour. The doctor took a look at her again and stated that she has reflux.

Basically, there is a sphincter at the top of the throat that opens and closes for food to pass through. Some babies don’t have a mature “open and close” reflex, so she would choke when starting to eat because the sphincter hadn’t opened, and when laying her flat after eating, the sphincter wouldn’t close, so she would spit everything back up. Babies eventually grow out of this, but to help Madeline, the doctor prescribed Zantac. It’s in liquid form and she takes 1 ML twice a day. This helps with the reflux so it doesn’t hurt her as much.

Since she’s been on the medication, it’s like night and day. She doesn’t love taking the medicine (which smells like peppermint), but she’s doing better swallowing it.

During this visit, Madeline is now 11 pounds 2 ounces. The doctor measured her and said that the length is still 20 ½, but he thinks that there may have been a mistake in measuring her at the hospital. Other than that, she’s happy and healthy!