Positive Steps

My sweetie pie has been making some positive steps in his eating habits.
Im so excited to see him actually exhibit hunger, he hasnt really done that since being placed on a feeding tube in June. Somtimes he wont let me out of the kitchen!
He isn't eating full meals but hes eating more while he grazes. One night he ate 3 chicken nuggets in a row. Chicken nuggets, let alone 3 had otherwise been unheard of.
He is also experimenting with more textures. At Christmas I made him some sugar free pudding with rice milk. He ate a few bites cautiously. Previously this texture would have made him gag and vomit.
I also have been encouraging him to drink his cornstarch. He's been drinking about an ounce of it and then refusing at which point I put the other two oz through his tube.
All of these things are making me hopeful that he will soon be able to get off of all his formula during the day.

He also has been enjoying carrying a carrot around to gnaw on.

The nurses swore to me it almost never happens. I should have known that Evan always played against the odds.
On Dec 23, Evan woke up with the scar at his gtube site looking really red. I'm a little obsessed with keeping it looking normal and immaculate so I was a little confused by it's redness.
I guess I should back track a little and explain that they have a tendency to leak stomach fluid.  The site needs to be cleaned a few times a day and kept dry. I also apply an ointment.  I keep intending to do a post about it.
I added some extra ointment and when on with the day. At noon I checked it again and this time it was more red and filled with fluid, like a blister. At that point I realize that its has done the 'impossible' and become infected. I put some Neosporin on it and call the surgical nurses to get some advice. They basically just said if it looks worse go to the ER.
YAY! the ER. Of course, its the day before Christmas Eve, people who fall ill during holidays have no other choice.
By 6pm his blister was about 1cm x 2cm and full of puss. I decide then that I will make the hour drive to the Children's Hospital. We have an ER that is closer but I don't trust them a whole lot and at least if there is a real problem, doctors who know us are close.
While getting my sweetie pie ready to go, it bursts. Gross, but nothing I can't handle.
So we finally arrive, the poor little guy had to endure a little more pain from the buckle on his car seat rubbing against it.
They were slow luckily and we are seen quickly. The doctors are a little peaked because they get to see a patient with a rare disease but overall are quite bored with the infection. They are glad that it opened on its own (they would have lanced it) and doesn't appear to be getting worse.

The diagnosis: probably a staph infection.

The treatment: Neosporin and some gauze!

WOW good thing I went to the ER.
Well, that visit will be chalked up to a paid medical lesson. Next time I will lance it myself, and slap some more Neosporin on it. If he gets a fever or spreading redness, then I will go to the ER.

It is still healing, slowly, two weeks later, so that gives me a little concern that it is getting too small and cutting into the skin. I just don't have enough experiences like this one to really say what is going on or what to do.
I'm planning on attending a class that is offered at the hospital as a little refresher and now that I've lived with it a while all the question I have now that I didn't know to ask before.
I hope all of my "life learning" with this will pay off for someone else one day. This was one time I wished I could get practical Mom advice.