Yes Gussyboy (and I) was in hospital for several weeks. He has been refusing to eat for several months now and made himself really sick from malnutrition. He weighed 6.53kg on admission to hospital. This is seriously underweight for a 17 month old! We now have him home from hospital with a nasal gastric tube (which is a feeding tube put through his nose direct into his tummy) and we're hooking him up to a kangaroo pump (feeding machine) each night so he can be continuously fed overnight. Then during the day we offer him solids and three milk feeds (which he usually rejects) and then we push more liquid food (a special formula for kids with serious allergies) into him via the tube at the end of each of these meals. Now we're home we have to go into the hospital every second day for blood and urine tests and every other day to see the paed, the dietician, the speech therapist (for feeding skills), the occupational therapist (for fine motor skills for feeding), the helmet clinic to get his helmet adjusted, the physio, the gastroenterologist, the allergy immunologist... It's been terribly worrying. I'm sorry I haven't been popping in very often. I've been having a really tough time of things lately. It's such a huge worry with Gussy. It looks like we're going to have this nasal gastric tube in for several months while we see whether he can put on weight if he is force fed the "right" amount. Then we have to work on how to get him interested in eating so he can become skilled in the various methods of eating. Aghhhhhh I just want everything to be "normal" whatever that is. This is really not how I imagined life for my gorgeous little boy. Sometimes I think my head will explode with the stress of it all, then at other times I remember how close we came to losing our little man during the pregnancy and the early months after his birth and it helps put it all in perspective. Anyhow enough ranting.

Nikki, I'm so excited to see you so close to giving birth to Harry. What a great name by the way! Must be so much to do. Are you having a c-section?

Melissa, Sorry to hear you three have been unwell. I hope warmer weather comes your way and helps to banish those sniffles.

K

BTW, I have updated Gus's website in the past day or so, in case you'd like to take a peak. xx