Hi friends!! So as many of you know our sweet little Zack has a mild form of the disease galactosemia!! Galactosemia as a full blown disease is VERY scary, so we are SO thankful that Zack only has a mild version of it!!! But, since he has even a mild version of the disease, we have been VERY careful for the past 11 months giving him any kind of milk product!!
(For more information on the disease Galactosemia, go here: http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition=galactosemia) or google "galactosemia."
Every newborn gets a whole round of tests done on them after they are born! Maddie's tests had come back just fine, so we didn't worry at all about them!! We just enjoyed our newborn baby boy!!! But, when Zack's tests stared to come back abnormal, our amazing pediatrician started asking some questions! We went in for blood work every other day for the first two weeks of Zack's life!!! At three weeks I was told to stop nursing and that Zack needed to be on Soy formula immediately!!! It was at that time that we started really learning about this disease!!! (No one had really told us anything at this point about what was going on!! Can you imagine my distress, having a 12 and a half moth old and a newborn and having to go to the hospital...it was crazy!!!!!)) But again I will say, we are THANKFUL that he doesn't have the full disease!! When Zack was just three months old we took him to a geneticist where we were told that Zack had a very mild form of Galactosemia and that we needed to keep him on soy milk for these first 10-11 months of his life until we did a "milk challenge"!! Mrs Peck (our geneticist specialist) told us that between 10-12 months we would need to slowly start giving Zack cow based milk to see how his body reacted!! We are really hoping that this disease has kind of "cured" itself with time!! Now if Zack had the full version of it, there is NO way he would ever be able to get over it! But since his form is so mild, we are hopeful!! So starting tomorrow we will begin giving him 2-4 ounces of regular formula with his soy formula!! We are going to try to wein him off of the soy and onto the regular, hoping that his body will tolerate it and that we will be able to give him milk products without any issue forever!!! If his body does not tolerate it, then he will be on a very strict diet for the rest of his life!!!
So please be praying for Zack and for us in these next 12 days!! We have been looking forward, and dreading this "milk challenge" ever since we heard we would need to do it!! After giving him cow's milk for the next 12 days, he will go in to be tested on Monday, July 20th and we will see what his levels are!!! Hopefully they will come back normal and he will be able to enjoy his first bite of ice cream for his birthday!!! :) Please just pray that he doesn't get sick and that his sweet body will be able to digest cow's milk and that he will be able to enjoy it!! Our little man LOVES to eat and I know he is going to LOVE the treats of ice cream, yogurt and cheese!!!
Thank you all for loving our family and being a part of our lives!! We love you!!
