Week's Update

Ben has done very well in his OT (occupational therapy) this week. He is working willingly with the therapist, and does especially well with a reward of some kind to motivate. She is working on his ability to chew. He only eats purees, so his muscles that he would use to chew are completely weak. She is working on building those with a chewy tube, a rubber chew toy type of thing. She has also noticed that he uses his front teeth to chew. That is very ineffective, and takes forever to get anything chewed up when the back grinders are not being utilized. She is teaching him to move food to the back of his mouth to be chewed there. She also gave him a couple sections of a clementine orange. He was able to eat that, even though it took about 10 minutes to get through it. The next session, he ate half of a clementine, and in the last session he ate a whole clementine in 11 1/2 minutes! That might not seem like a big deal to most people, but for a kid who can't chew correctly, and has severe oral sensory issues, that is huge. I am also excited because I will be able to put an orange into his lunchbox next year, and he will be able to have a "normal" food to eat at school. She is also working on adding texture to his food, and will let his feeding therapists know when they can add texture to his meals.

As for his feeding therapy, they are working on eating in a decent amount of time. They are using movie time to motivate him. He loves to pick a movie, then earn 15 minutes of viewing time. He gets through movies piecemeal, but he eventually does get through them. When he eats now, he is rewarded for eating quickly, and for taking bites by himself, without therapist help.

As for the pureed chickpeas or garbanzo beans, he hates them. They have thus far required him to take one bite per meal. He will do it as long as the therapist feeds him the bite, and he fights her off by hitting and turning his head. He really gags on it, but in the end, it goes down. He refers to the pureed chickpeas as "chicken peas." He is convinced that he only likes his 5 breakfast/lunch foods, so anything outside of that list is a food that he doesn't like. I'm so hoping they'll help him realize that food in variety is a great thing. I think that they will require two bites this week. It sounds like ridiculously slow progress, but when they explain the psychology of it all, it makes sense to me. I am glad I am here, and I know that this program is definately the best for Benjamin.