In order to survive your child's infant reflux or
GERD, you really need to understand that you are not the only one
having difficulty managing. Of course, you already know how stressful
and exhausting it is, you are living it, but to really understand,
from a practical, intellectual standpoint can make all the
difference. You need to know that it's not just you and that it is
really, just very hard. There are several aspects of having a baby
that is suffering from infant reflux or infant GERD that make it
particularly difficult for parents. The emotional stress infant
reflux puts on the family can be unbearable and is absolutely
limitless. This can affect every single aspect of the entire family.
Babies with reflux are well known for spending a great deal of time
upset, irritable, crying and even screaming the most intense, piercing
screams one could ever imagine. Parents, by nature, are programmed to
respond to a crying baby and address the reason behind the crying.
It's heartbreaking for a parent to not be able to help their baby in
times of great need. The more the baby cries, the more stressed and
upset they can get when unable to comfort and help the baby. Some may
even secretly begin to have feelings of dislike or anger towards the
baby for being so difficult and unhappy. Such feelings can make the
parents feel even worse since they know they are not supposed to feel
that way. Feelings of guilt and sorrow can begin to emerge. Guilt
over not being able to make the baby stop hurting, and for mothers,
also in wondering what they could have done during pregnancy or
delivery to cause the baby's reflux. Parent's can feel sorrow and
deep sadness coming to the realization that the perfect, happy and
healthy baby of which they dreamed, does not exist and they instead,
have a baby with great health demands and possibly special needs.
Many things that other parents and babies are able to do, may not be
possible and they almost mourn the healthy baby they had expected and
all the things they are missing. Sheer exhaustion can magnify all
these feelings as babies with reflux are notoriously poor sleepers,
sometimes sleeping only an hour or less at a time through the night.
Other children in the family can begin to feel left out or neglected
when the new baby demands such intense and constant care far beyond
the enormous amount of care that baby's normally require.
Moms can get particularly tired and frustrated in frequently being
the primary caregiver, they can become the only person that has any
success in feeding or comforting the baby. This adds extra demands to
mom and can leave dad feeling helpless, left out and frustrated in not
being able to do more to help. This can indeed put added pressure on
the marriage.
Many parents begin feel isolated from their family and friends who
just don't understand how hard it is and how much their baby actually
suffering. Well meaning loved ones can sometimes dismiss new parent's
concerns as being over reactions and unwarranted. They may
inadvertently blame the parents, saying the baby is spoiled or needs
to be left alone to cry it out. This can leave parents feeling like
maybe it is their fault or something they are doing wrong, adding to
the stress and feelings of guilt. When you are already struggling to
get through each day these comments, or lack of support from those you
love can be devastating and some may begin to pull away and avoid
their family altogether, at a time when they really need all the
understanding and support they can get.
Many times, particularly when the baby has GERD and the possible
development issues and special needs that can accompany it, mothers
may have a difficult time being around other mothers whose children
are happy and healthy. Everyone wants their baby to be the smartest
and healthiest and when they are not, or begin to fall behind their
peers, it can be very difficult to accept.
Doctors, who are expected to know all the answers and fix the baby
can become an added burden to parents who perceive them to be
unwilling to help or even listen to the parents concerns. They are
asked to wait weeks or months for appointments, or test results, and
then may not get any real answers or solutions anyway. They are carted
from doctor to doctor, each saying the next will help. They are asked
to make decisions when they have little understanding of the pros and
cons and they do not know whom to ask or where to go for an impartial
opinion.
Financial issues can begin to arise, when expensive formulas,
medications, and numerous doctor appointments or hospital stays get
too much for the household budget.
Overcoming these ever present issues can be a daily battle, but is
possible. Some days you will thrive and come out on top, feeling like
you can handle anything, other days will be more difficult and you may
just want to crawl under a rock. The trick is getting the number of
good days to slowly outweigh the bad and there are ways to do this.
The first thing to help relieve the stress is to actively work on
helping your baby in every way you can.
- Start now with the 14 simple ways to reduce infant reflux that
we have listed.
- If this doesn't give baby enough relief decide whether or not it
might be time for medication and if you believe it is, read up on
the different medications used to treat infant reflux so that you
can be sure you know enough to be the best advocate you can be for
your baby. You need to understand; however, that not all medications
work equally effectively for all babies. For many babies finding a
treatment option that works can take weeks or months of trial and
error with different medications and formula combinations. But once
you stop expecting a quick fix and realize that this will likely be
a long, hard road you can begin to better focus on the task at hand.
- In some cases, the lifestyle modifications and initial
medications will not help, this may be an indication that referral
to a pediatric gastroenterologist might be the next step.
There will be more on actively helping your baby in a future
article, for now the next thing you need to do to survive is learn
acceptance and get some peace. It sounds easy, just accept it and
move on, and although it's not even a little easy to get to that
place, it can be the best thing you do for yourself and your baby.
Although for most babies, relief can be found through any of the
treatments listed on this site, for many there are no magic cures, no
easy answers and it's more than just a little heartburn or spit up.
Remember that it's not the baby that's bad or being difficult, you
have a chronically ill child, that's reality, it's not fair and it
sucks, but it's reality. You can handle it two ways, let it consume
you and completely take over or rise above it and live simply with the
peace of loving your baby exactly the way they are.
Things may not be going exactly as you envisioned when you were
pregnant and planning for the little one and as hard as it is right
now, it could be a lot worse and it will get easier. Try starting a
personal diary and writing about how you feel. Join the message board
and seek out support from others that have been there and understand
what you are feeling. Reach out and help others in the same
situation, make something positive come from your child's illness.
Take every opportunity you possibly can to get a break, even if it's
just to lock yourself in the bathroom for a hot bath while hubby rocks
the baby to sleep. Sleep when the baby sleeps, this is especially
important with refluxers, because you never know when they will
actually sleep again.
|
