Torture Take Two

Yesterday Elijah had his second Upper-GI study. This time, they put an NG tube down his throat to get the barium into his system (there just was no way he was going to drink that stuff!). Just like last time, it wasn't fun. This time, however, they were able to do a complete study.

Everything looked fine; the barium moved through like it's supposed to. The only negative comment the radiologist said was that Elijah's stomach empties really slowly. Elijah hadn't eaten for three hours before the study and yet his stomach was still pretty full of food. His stomach remained distended even after they had removed the food from it. This isn't really surprising to us as he'll spit up hours after he's had anything to eat or drink.

In some ways I was hoping for a structural problem. Not that I would want there to be something wrong, but then we'd have a definitive answer and something to fix. Now, we're left with not knowing what to do to help our little guy digest his food. All we can do is to continue to hope that his reflux and digestion will improve over time. And, we can be grateful that there isn't something structurally wrong because that would mean he'd need surgery. Overall, the test is good news, but it leaves us not knowing where we should go from here.

I'm glad it's over. It definitely feels like torturing our child. So, we'll wait to hear from the GI doctor to see what he thinks. And we'll keep hoping and praying for improvements.

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