Dear Caleb,

Today you are two! We can't believe how quickly the past two years have flown by. The day you were born was when our lives changed in more ways than we could've ever imagined. Daddy and Mommy are blessed to experience a love beyond all measures and find so much joy by having you in our lives. Your vibrant nature and excitement for life make us smile day after day. You have taught us how to appreciate the simplest of things. Everyday we look forward to the ways that you will make us laugh. We look forward to seeing all of the new things you will say and do. You are talking more everyday and learning new words all the time. You love to sing. You're obsessed with sports. You love to read and even have some of your favorite books memorized. You could spend hours outdoors and never get bored. You are trying so hard to become independent, sometimes at the cost of throwing fits until you do it yourself! You love to watch Mickey, Dora, Clifford, and Charlie Brown. Your imagination is growing each day. You could eat mac-n-cheese for every meal, yet you still manage to enjoy whatever food is placed in front of you and never complain. You love your dog and she has become your buddy. You're a great sleeper and have done so well with your big boy bed. You are a wonderful big brother and are beginning to show Leah just how lucky she is to have you to look up to. You still love to snuggle, kiss, and hug. You pray and it makes our hearts melt. You truly have the light of the Lord shining through you and we love how we can understand just how great He is by watching you.

We look forward to the memories that we continue to make together. God has given you the ability to touch not only our lives, but the lives of so many other people. Anywhere you go, you capture the attention of those around you. God has blessed you with abundant love from so many. Throughout life, we are certain that you will return that blessing by continuing to bring so much love to those around you. So today, Daddy and Mommy (and so many other people) are rejoicing because of the memories we've made and praying for SO many more years of memories to come!!!

We love you more than you'll ever, ever know...

Could it be?!?

Just as soon as I posted the long explanation of Leah's pooping problems we had a miracle! Yesterday afternoon, she had her first big poop....ALL BY HERSELF! And to make us even more sure that she is finally getting the hang of it, she had another poop today. Praise God for everything being okay :)

On Sunday night, I ate a small Activia yogurt...and again on Monday morning...and again this morning. I'm going to have to say that this might just have something to do with it. They say that everything you eat passes through your milk to the baby, so I can only assume that whatever magical stuff is in this yogurt is what did the trick!

And along these lines, I must say that changing poopy diapers on a girl is a thousand times harder than on a boy. I've always heard people say that, but never realized until now just how true that is!

The Scoop on Poop

Yep...that's right...this post is going to be all about that lovely 4 letter word. If you're not into talking about such crude matters, I highly suggest you skip this post and wait for the next one (whenever that will be)!

The Sturm family has utilized that 4 letter word more in the last two months than we ever thought we would. Everything in life has revolved around our newborn and poop!

When Leah was born, she passed most of that icky meconium that newborns have to get out within the early days. Unfortnuately, she didn't get all of it out early enough and that was what caused her bilirubin levels to jump (and gave us an extended stay in the hospital for jaundice). After she was about a week old, and still wasn't going, we called our pediatrician. She suggested using "rectal stimulation" to get her to clear out the last of the meconium. In other words, we had to use a thermometer for more than just checking her temperature!

Things went well after that. Leah was gaining weight and nursing well. I had to keep a chart of her eating, peeing, and pooping habits for the pediatrician because she wanted to monitor her weight gain (which started off slow, but picked up after a week or two). She seemed to be doing what every newborn should. I felt like her poops were much smaller than Caleb's ever were and just figured that was because she was just attempting to be "lady-like"!

Fast-forward a few weeks to when Leah was about a month old and we quickly realized that her eliminating patterns had changed quite a bit. She went for about five days without pooping and started to get very fussy. We called the doctor in a panic and thought she must have been constipated (which is almost unheard of for breastfed babies). She had us use rectal stimulation again to help her feel more comfortable. That began the long road that we've been on for almost two months.

Since that point, we've had to help Leah poop every couple days in order for her to feel more comfortable. We've also tried giving her Karo Syrup and baby suppositories. To make things even more stressful, we have had to visit a pediatric gastroenterologist, watch our little girl get a barium enima, visit a pediatric surgeon, and have a rectal biopsy done on our two month old. The stress has been incredible as this entire process has been a part of the doctor's attempt to rule out any major complications...which we praise God for the fact that everything has shown that she is completely healthy. At the same time, we have no explanation for why Leah is struggling to poop and it's become very difficult to see her suffering.

We are now at the point where we are trying to wait as long as possible to see if she will just go on her own. It is rare, but there are breastfed babies who only go every 10 days or so. The last time she had help pooping was Tuesday of last week. She has grown pretty uncomfortable, but we are starting to wonder if she might just be gassy and fussy by nature. Overall, the guessing game that we've been playing for awhile now is wearing on us all. With no real answers and just a whole lot of trial and error, we keep waiting for the day when we will just look back on all of this and laugh. In the meantime, we're still getting very little sleep and having a hard time deciding where to go from here. More than likely, we will be switching to formula sooner than we had hoped....in the hopes that a diet change will help her become more regular.

All the while, we have tried to keep life as "normal" as possible for all of us, especially Caleb. It's been hard to give him the attention he has needed and he's definitely starting to get jealous of his sister. We are so thankful for both sets of grandparents, who continue to help out in more ways than we could ever ask for! Grandma Sue has been here just about every other weekend since Leah was very young and it has been such a blessing to have her help! During the week, Grandma Leslie makes frequent visits to lend a helping hand.

For now, we need a whole lot of prayer and are trusting that God has a plan and purpose for all of this. We love our little girl and just want to see her happy. Despite all of the digestion issues, she manages to smile in a way that melts our hearts. We know she'd probably be a thousand times happier if she wasn't dealing with all of this and can't wait for the day to come when she is past it all.