Prayer Request – 4/10

Lucky for us, we LOVE our pediatrician as well as our cardiologist since we see them both so often now :) 4 kids and a heart baby with special needs & weekly therapy, we see the doctor often. Gideon got to see the pediatrician again today for a possible umbilical granuloma. He was treated for it 3 weeks ago but it hasn’t healed. He always has some gooey yellow’ish ooze on the inside of his shirts that comes from his belly button. His belly button never healed right from birth and still isn’t quite right. It’s quite a cute little ‘swirly button’, as we call them here but it oozes and it bothers me. There is no smell to it but still, it’s gross. So he was treated for it with a silver nitrate stick at his 2 month well child check and it’s still oozing. I took him back today to have it looked at again.

The doctor said it looks exactly like a granuloma but there is a small chance that it’s an umbilical polyp instead which would need to be closed in a surgical procedure. We are hoping it’s just the granuloma and I have some follow up treatments I can use at home for it and of course, I’ll be researching what essential oils could help this as well :) The prayer request is that it’s just a granuloma and it will dry out/close up with this treatment he got today. It looks like a matchstick they stick into his belly button and rub around on top of the granuloma which looks like a little red, wet ball of skin inside his belly button.

We also had his weekly therapy today which went great. He is showing progress though still doesn’t have great head control. Our goals for therapy right now are head control and neck/trunk strength. Progress is consistent but slow, I’m very excited for better head control soon. The therapist asked me if I had a play mat for him and I said I do, I just recently put it back into the closet. I feel bad putting him on the play mat and leaving him be because I feel like it’s just boring and I’m ignoring him so I don’t use it really anymore. She reminded me of the therapeutic benefits of the mat so I got it back out today and he is batting at toys and has his legs going full time which is great exercise for him. He isn’t doing tummy  time on it yet because he doesn’t even really do tummy time yet since his trunk and neck are still so weak but eventually, he will. Right now tummy time is assisted with a roll on the floor or on our chest with assistance as he grows stronger.

I kind of want to get him an inflatable water tummy time mat to play with like the one below (amazon picture) because that looks fun for a kid for tummy time. To be able to push down and have little inflatable fish float around inside looks fun. Have any of you ever used something like this for their kids for tummy time? What did you think? I think it could be fun and beneficial for his therapy but the OCD in me with wanting less and less (and MUCH MUCH less) stuff in this house doesn’t want any additional ‘stuff’ in the house to find a home to store, bring in and bring out to vacuum everyday, move around and clean up, etc…. hahaha 

Again, thanks for the prayers… I’ll let ya know how the ooze dries up soon!