Onward

I wanted to mention (at the risk of sounding defensive), that this isn't sudden. We've been working toward this for a long long time now. Also, she used to eat a tiny bit. We discontinued that once she came to us, under doctors' advice, because of the severity of both her aspiration and GERD, which caused her to throw up every single time.

We just believe, along with her therapists, ENT, GI, and Ped, that she is ready cognitively as well as anatomically, to ramp it up a bit. I most definitely will not force anything - but in this short time she has gone from shaking an crying to just opening her mouth and swallowing. It's pretty amazing, and I have to keep reminding myself that it has been appropriate to NOT do this before now. I actually am feeling more guilty about not pushing her previously than I am about pushing her now.

She has always mimicked eating, tried to feed us, wanted to sit at the table. We just haven't made any issue of her food avoidance. It's not that I think I was wrong to have been "easy" on her, I can't help but wonder if, as soon as we got the go ahead (which was months ago), we'd be so much further along.

So, it's kind of funny (though I totally understand where y'all are coming from!!!!!) that this has kind of come off as if I'm pushing too hard - because my greatest concern was that I hadn't pushed hard enough.