I think my child was abducted 3 days ago and replaced with one that exactly looks the same but eats. Yes, I tell you, EATS! Now I'm not going to extrapolate to say she's "cured" - it's way, way too early for that. It could just be some growth spurt and she'll go back to her non-eating ways soon enough. I just have to say that having a kid who eats for 3 days straight relieves a lot of stress in my life. I think it's actually a domino effect. Because she has been eating well for 3 days, she's not (gasp) hungry all the time. Which leads to her disposition being a whole lot better. Yeah, she'll throw herself down onto the floor and kick and scream, but the reason she does that is she can't have the toy she wants at that moment. She does her toddler tantrum, S and I walk away, and a minute later she's recovered from the apocalypse and comes to find us with a smile on her face. What I'm talking about is the cranky, disagreeable disposition hasn't made an appearance.
I'm not extrapolating any more than that. I'm taking it for what it is. It has been a wonderful 3 days. Not only in the three days has Julia been drinking amounts that surpassed anything she has drank when she was 4-5 months old (before any solid foods), but she also has eaten 300-500 calories worth of food for each of the 3 days. Probably a "normal" kid eats more than this, but I look on in amazement when a "good" day used to be considered half a cereal bar and 10 little pieces of cheese (maybe 80 calories total, and that was spread out over a whole day).
It is a long weekend, and we're not daycare. The thing with daycare is that Julia sees lots of kids her size sitting down to eat the same thing. S and I sit with her at meals, but our food usually doesn't look like hers (i.e., it's not cut all up into bite-size pieces). So I'm not holding out much hope that we can maintain it this weekend. Plus, a good streak with her is always followed by a crash and burn. The crash and burn is always bad, bad, bad.
Now I know it sounds like I'm being a pessimist. And I am. But behind that pessimism, you know I am hoping that she's indeed "cured." She just turned 15 months. Could 15 months be when her body decided to get its act together and actually voluntarily eat? I have heard that milk intolerance can hang around til 15 months in a small percentage of kids. Something about it takes longer in some kids for their gut to mature. See, now I start thinking and getting my hopes up.
So, again, I'm trying to take the 3 days for only what they are. It's not really working well though.
P.S. I turned comments off for this post. I can't bear to read positive comments about what a turnaround this is (as nice as they are, thank you, you always have encouraging comments). If she does go back to her old ways, it will actually be depressing for me to read them. Does that make any sense? I know, I'm strange. Deal with it!
