Feeding and speech therapy

[Guest guest]

As the father of a teenage RSS child, I thought I would relate my

experience with this avenue of treatment. My daughter's Doctors at

the U of Minnesota recommended speech therapy when she was about 1 to

1 1/2. She had been receiving the bulk of her calories and nutrition

from breastfeeding and an NG tube. we worked with a couple of

different STs over the next 2 years with little or no success. She

even spent a month in the hospital so they could monitor every effort

to feed her. It was extremely traumatic for my daughter (I'm not

just talking the hospital, but also about the sessions) and

absolutely no fun for me. Finally her GI doctor started looking for

some other reasons why feeding Hollister was so difficult. Through

extensive upper and lower GI tests (these were very easy for my

daughter) they sound significant malrotation and adhesions in her GI

tract. Through laparascopic surgery they were able to correct some

of these problems, although she still gets the bulk of her feeding

from a GI tube at night. While she will probably need surgery again

down the line, I am soo glad we had a proactive Peds GI doc. Her

efforts quite likely saved my daughter's life. Hollister now eats

some, although her lack of natural appetite requires the continued

feeding. She's a beautiful teenage sophmore in high school, who

(fortunately for her dear old dad) still thinks boys are clueless

idiots and wants nothing to do with them. I'm sure that will

change. Thanks for listening.