Time To Change The #PKU Diet!

     Thomas is growing so quickly that we're starting to have to make a lot of changes in his #PKU diet!  As sad as I am to stop nursing, it is time.  He's my last baby and I'd love to cuddle, soothe, and bond with him longer through nursing, but he's needing more protein.  He's needing protein from solid foods, so that means that the protein from my milk needs to be limited and eventually gone.

     We're not exactly sure how much phe, Thomas is getting from me because there's no exact way of figuring that out.  He does get 45 phe a day from baby cereal and an uncertain amount from me.  Our dietitian is assuming that he's getting between 30-50 phe from my milk.  Thomas' levels have been great, always between the 2-4 range.  He's definitely growing and meeting all of his milestones.

Not a big fan of applesauce!

 
     So I'm at the point where I have to make the conscious effort to not nurse Thomas when he needs to take a nap or calm down.  I need to soothe him in other ways and give him more formula in the bottle.  The hard part is that out of all 4 of the kids, Thomas is the one who love nursing the most!  I'm not totally ready to give this up yet and I'm pretty sure Thomas is going to hate it!  Lily didn't have a problem weening, she practically went cold turkey.

     I have a cabinet full of fruit baby foods and a box of baby rice cereal.  So I'm going to start weening him this week and exchanging my breast milk for more baby foods.  The next couple of weeks will be rough.  Thomas will need to try more foods and I'll need to be more consistent on his heel pricks.  This is when we'll be playing with the right combination of phe foods and formula!  So wish us luck.