dazed and confused

i can honestly tell you i have no idea what day it is.  what time it is or what is coming up next.  I've slipped into autopilot and am just trying to get thru each day the best i can.  We're having a very rough patch with Dylan.  she has stopped eating again, which means each feeding is a colossal battle to get her to open her mouth, drink the formula, swallow the formula and stay still long enough to get at least a 1/3 of the bottle in her.  it's exhausting for us all.  but she's the one who clearly suffers the most.  it is heartbreaking right now.  While i can assure myself that once home this will all be bad memories, right now it feels like more than i can handle.  and then we manage to get thru a feeding and survive the moment.  I'm fairly sure the renewed struggle is because we've moved locations, we're on absolutely no schedule.  she's eating drips and drabs and well it's tough right now.  to top it off, she's showing no gross motor skills and that's concerning.

at least today Dylan had two full bottles and what a giant relief that was.  I decided with the incredibly little bit of food she was taking in, I'd up her formula. i had brought it way down after the great constipation episode, but i have to get nutrients into her somehow.  so she's on nearly 3 scoops of formula, with pureed fruit (love those squeeze pouches!) and a miralax kicker.  no poop since Friday so looks like we'll have to induce poop again.  this poor child.  I'm forcing activity out of every end, orifice and part of her.

Yesterday (was that Saturday?) we had our medical.  it's not like seeing a doctor it's just a cursory exam to ensure the child and documentation match and that the child is not too ill to travel.  when we were there the doctor asked me can Dylan, walk, talk, feed herself, stand?  no no no no.  you can tell she was concerned but said nothing.  but we got thru the medical with no red flags thrown so that's good.  Later we went out, as a group. for dinner and that was nice to see all the families with their little ones,  i had met many of the families in Beijing and here we are again, but with our babies.  somehow the medical, the paperwork meeting and dinner took up the entire day.  it drags by and yet flies by all at the same time.  our constant comment:  we can't wait to get home!  soon, we all assure each other.

We went to the Jade and Pearl market today and i bought both my daughters pretty little bracelets.  if you're into fine jewelry (which I'm not) this is definitely  a place you'll want to go to. but the place i truly wanted to see was, Shamian Island, and it really was just a nice as everyone told me.  it's a beautiful park like area with the now closed for remodeling White Swan hotel and all these shops.  we had lunch (western food!) outside, walked along the river and then hit the stores.  lots of goodies for my kids.  But the best part is that we survived our first outdoors feeding and even though Dylan cried and screamed and I'm sure we had all eyes on us, we double teamed her and had her drinking her bottle.  in fact this was her second FULL bottle of the day!  so we were feeling pretty good.  we may have stayed a little too long as she was getting really antsy towards the end so we cabbed it back and here we are back in our nice hotel room.  As i sit here on my bed, in the dark, with Dylan resisting her nap on one side, and Judy glued to her kindle on the other, I'm so grateful to have gotten thru another day.  as a treat we're ordering in Papa Johns pizza tonight!   Little does Dylan know there's a bath in store for her tonight and then a good nights rest for us all.    we decided to skip the big tours tomorrow (too much stress on Na Na) and just hang out here and take it easy.  hopefully we'll manage a cab ride back to Shamian Island, but if not, so be it.

for now, I'm truly exhausted, but i keep telling myself once we get home ONCE WE GET HOME, it will be easier.  we'll figure out how best to feed Dylan, we'll get her on a routine and we'll all settle in. I'll get to see the new crib that Jeff and the kids are out shopping for!   i can't wait.   and for at least these few minutes, I'm feeling content and that's what gets us through the day and fortifies us for tomorrow.