What is Failure to Thrive?
The short of it is your infant is not progessing along with the norm of most infants. Physicians have over the course of time established growth charts that dictate how your child should progress. When your infant falls significantly below a certain percentile for an extended period of time you may get a diagnosis of "failure to thrive". We will get into the medical jargon of it further on because chances are it may not be the only thing going on. This site will discuss as much as it can about the medical piece of it, however, I want to make it easy to understand.
It must also be said this is a forum to learn, share, and gather information. Nothing on this site is a substitute for proper medical care. I am not a doctor or an expert, only you and your doctors can determine what will be the best course of action for your child
and family.
It must also be said this is a forum to learn, share, and gather information. Nothing on this site is a substitute for proper medical care. I am not a doctor or an expert, only you and your doctors can determine what will be the best course of action for your child
and family.
What it may mean to your family.
Chances are even if you don't know exactly what is wrong you have some idea something is not right. Your baby may throw up a lot, may not seem to eat a lot, seems fragile, your baby may have spent time in the NICU, was premature, had/has issues nippling. You may also have noticed that your doctor is monitoring things more closely. It may also mean everything was "normal", your baby just won't gain weight.
It may mean things are not going to happen like you have heard. It may mean a lot of doctors visits, crying, stress, people asking you questions you cannot answer.
It is important to not let it be all bad, if you are seeking medical care and doing all you can to help your baby then just know - your baby if not blaming you or accusing you, your baby is loving you just like any baby would love their parent. So use those extra feeding times for more bonding. Your baby can feel the stress so let it go everytime you pick them up, even if they proceed to throw up all over you. It also means get people involved, ask for help to share the burden so you can breathe. It will feel overwhelming at times, the situation, like any medical issue can boil over into other areas of life if you don't get help.
Be sure to access your county/state benefits. These benefits can be open to families and single parents and I encourage everyone to look into them. Being a parent of a high or special needs child - as our failure to thrive babies can/will be labelled can add significant obstacles to overcome.
It may mean things are not going to happen like you have heard. It may mean a lot of doctors visits, crying, stress, people asking you questions you cannot answer.
It is important to not let it be all bad, if you are seeking medical care and doing all you can to help your baby then just know - your baby if not blaming you or accusing you, your baby is loving you just like any baby would love their parent. So use those extra feeding times for more bonding. Your baby can feel the stress so let it go everytime you pick them up, even if they proceed to throw up all over you. It also means get people involved, ask for help to share the burden so you can breathe. It will feel overwhelming at times, the situation, like any medical issue can boil over into other areas of life if you don't get help.
Be sure to access your county/state benefits. These benefits can be open to families and single parents and I encourage everyone to look into them. Being a parent of a high or special needs child - as our failure to thrive babies can/will be labelled can add significant obstacles to overcome.
How did this happen?
This is almost an impossible question to answer. Failure to thrive can be as mysterious as the lochness monster. It can be attributed to a genetic condition, you could fall into that 1 in 200,000 category. It is also possible that no one can tell you why or how.
What is this site about?
Beating the odds....
and if we cannot achieve that more quickly then at least making lemonade out of lemons until we do. It is my ultimate goal to start a non-profit organization that will be able to help anyone find help for their babies sooner than later. I want to have advocates that can help people find doctors, ask questions, make sure they understand that we can make sure we give our babies the best chance possible. It will not always be a miracle story and I know that. Failure to thrive is a phrase that is attached to a lot of scary diagnosis' and some of them don't always have fairytale endings.
What I do know is Grace has taught me so much about enjoying everyday and I cannot lie sometimes the future has me in tears but she is my blessing and I plan on repaying her in whatever way I can.
Beyond that I want there to be more out there. I started thinking about a clothing line for G and J tube babies, started to look into it and I found very little out there. I started experiencing the tube leaking and Grace being in discomfort from that and wanted to have better solutions to the problem. I want more for our FTT babies, I believe there is more we can do from start to finish.
What I do know is Grace has taught me so much about enjoying everyday and I cannot lie sometimes the future has me in tears but she is my blessing and I plan on repaying her in whatever way I can.
Beyond that I want there to be more out there. I started thinking about a clothing line for G and J tube babies, started to look into it and I found very little out there. I started experiencing the tube leaking and Grace being in discomfort from that and wanted to have better solutions to the problem. I want more for our FTT babies, I believe there is more we can do from start to finish.
