Happy Birthday Baby!

Eleanor turned one year old yesterday!  We had a party for her on Saturday with about ten people, mostly family.  It was a good party and she got tons of new toys and clothes!  She spent all day yesterday playing with her new push toy (from mommy and daddy).  She loves to walk around behind it.  She is so close to taking her first step on her own, but isn’t there quite yet.  Hopefully soon!  For now she moves much more quickly crawling so she doesn’t have much incentive to walk.

She’s now saying dada and versions of mom (mama, ma, nen, even Jenn recently), as well as “hi” and “up”.  Her little voice is so sweet!  She learned those last two in just the last week or so, so she seems to be learning quickly now.  I’m looking forward to hearing the next word!

She doesn’t have another appt until the end of the month, so I weighed her (on our Wii Fit, haha) and measured her myself.  She’s now about 18.5 lbs (13%) and 29″ tall (59%).  So she’s still  skinny, but not as much as before (she was 16% weight and 87% height at 9mo).  We’ve been feeding her a ton but I guess she might need even more.  Yikes!

We gave her soy milk for the first time the other day and she loved it.  I’m hoping to swap out a couple nursing sessions a day for it, but so far she seems to be treating it as more of a supplement than a meal.  Now that I know her stats, maybe that’s a good thing.  I’m planning on continuing to breastfeed for the foreseeable future, hopefully until she’s about two, which is the WHO recommendation.  We’ll see how it goes.

She popped her first molar on the 12th, which brings her grand total up to nine teeth!  Her sleeping is still all over the board, largely from the constant teething.  Though apparently I was a horrible sleeper as a baby too, so it could just be that.  I am so thankful that I’m able to stay home with her!  Besides the fact that I love being here with her, I would be a zombie at work most days.

I can’t believe my baby is one, but I also look at her and see a one year old.  This year just went too fast.  I hope the next one is a little slower, and I can’t wait to see what it brings!

It’s been too long!

I’ve been busy enjoying summer and early fall with Eleanor, and lost track of this blog!  I’m sure all you mommies out there understand.  : )

We’ve all been doing well.  I’m still BFing Eleanor, though she’s also eating some solids now.  She’s eating one “meal” a day, though yesterday she had two and we’ll see what happens today.  So far she’s liked everything but avocado, though she loved the taste of guac John gave her the other day.  I make most of her baby food, and have successfully stuck to all organic things to date.  We’ll see how long I can keep it up!  She’s still sensitive to dairy, though it’s not as bad as before.  Nw if I eat it she gets a little fussy and gassy for a few days, which is mean to do to her but not nearly as ill as she used to get.  I’m hopeful that she’ll outgrow it by the time she’s a year old, though I’m planning on BFing well past that so that we don’t have to wean her to other milk.  I’d like to avoid giving her cow/goat/soy/etc. milk for a while (she reacts to cow and goat cheese, and we’re not completely sure about soy), and rice milk has almost no nutritional value.

Eleanor is trying to learn how to crawl right now, though we won’t be surprised if she walks before crawls.  She loves to stand up and can do so for a few seconds completely unsupported now, though it’s hit or miss.  She stands at her activity table until she gets bored, or tries to lunge for something else and topples over.  She doesn’t seem to quite get that she can move her feet *before* moving her body, lol!

She’s gaining well and growing like a weed.  I’m not completely sure what her stats are right now (forgot to take them at seven months), though I think we’ll be moving her into the next car seat soon.  We got her a Britax Marathon, which I’m happy about.  I feel safe moving her into it.  I’ll miss the ease of carrying her in her infant seat, but she’s getting too heavy for me now, anyway!

Nothing else much is going on in our lives.  I’m a  political junky, so I’m loving all the election stuff.  I’ve also been sewing diapers for Eleanor, since I finally figured out I could probably do it better on my own and for less.  (Bamboo fleece is a wonder fabric!  It absorbs so much liquid, and is very thin.  For once my cloth-diapered baby doesn’t have a huge bubble butt!)  Oh, and we’re heading to Disneyland for Christmas!  I’m so excited about this!  We haven’t been in probably five years, and of course this will be Eleanor’s first time.  I think she’ll be too young to enjoy it, but we sure will.  : )  We’re going with my immediate family, and also visiting some relatives down South for a week after, so it’ll be a long trip.  Should be fun!  I just hope it isn’t too stressfull with Eleanor.  We’ve taken quite a few smaller trips with her (across the mountains to see Grandma and Grandpa), but nothing like this.

I hope to be a better blogger in the future, though I’ve always been bad at this sort of thing, lol!  Maybe I’ll expand out a bit from just writing about Eleanor…

Long time, no write!

OK, I’m back!  From where I’m not sure, but I’m back nonetheless.  : )  Maybe from new-mommy fogland?

Where to begin…  Well, John went back to work on May 12th, which is the main reason I haven’t written a new post on here in ages.  Nora has been quite the handful for me, and since I’ve also taken on the majority of the night shift (John needs to sleep on weekdays, and he can’t breastfeed anyway) I’ve been pretty tired. Every time I think we’ve gotten on a nice little schedule, Nora throws a curve ball and it seems we’re back to square one.  She does go to bed at about the same time every night – 9pm – though she wakes pretty erratically.  Some nights she’ll go seven straight hours, others she wakes every two hours.  Ack!

Nora has gotten one round of vaccinations so far.  We decided to follow Dr. Sears’ alternative schedule, so at two months she got the rotavirus oral vaccine, and the DTaP shot.  She seemed to do ok.  She slept most of that day, and we gave her Tylenol every four hours which kept her fairly happy when she was awake.  She was supposed to get Pc (pneumococcal) and HiB (hemophaelus influenza B) this past week, but there’s apparently a nationwide shortage of HiB and they were out.  We’re going back next Tuesday to get those.

Cutting dairy out of my diet worked, yay!  Her colic and reflux got much much better.  Every time I eat too much dairy (she can tolerate small amounts, depending on what it is) she has a very bad, fussy day, and gets diarrhea and diaper rashes.  Poor thing.  : (  It really stinks not eating dairy – I miss pizza! – but it’s worth it.  Supposedly she should start growing out of this in the next few months, but we’ll see.  In the meantime I’m taking lots of calcium supplements.

New fun thing making her fussy though: teething!!!  She started at 10 weeks!  She’s chewing everything, especially her own hands, drooling like crazy, fussier than usual, and sleeping poorly (hence the tired mom!)  I didn’t really believe that was what was going on until I talked to my parents and found out that I had two teeth at eight weeks.  Unfortunately for us, Nora is now almost 14 weeks old and still hasn’t popped a tooth.  I keep hearing that the worst is over once the teeth show themselves, but that it can sometimes take months.  I look every morning, but nothing yet!

Milestone-wise, she’s doing great!  She’s holding her head up very well now.  She still gets a little wobbly after a while, but will hold it up almost indefinitely in any position you put her in.  She likes to sit or stand, and will do either one with minimal support.  She’s not quite ready for her Exersaucer, but I think in a couple more weeks she will be.  She’s not rolling yet, but can lift herself up pretty well while doing tummy time, so she’s not as miserable doing that anymore.  She lasts about five minutes on her belly before yelling at us for mistreating her, instead of the previous two, haha!  She’s down to about eight nursings a day, which is apparently a little more than average for her age but I’m thrilled with it!  She’s cooing and smiling like crazy, and is learning how to squeal.  She definitely knows mommy and daddy and gets very excited when she sees us.  It’s so sweet.  : )  She’s not quite grabbing things yet, but will bring anything in her hand – our fingers, a terry cloth burp rag – to her mouth and chow down on it.  We bought her a little floor gym last weekend, and after a couple days she figured out how to kick her toys to make them swing and rattle.  She loves it and will happily play there for up to half an hour at a time!  It’s wonderful for her and great for me.  ; )

The cloth diapering is going well, too.  I think the Thirsties pocket-AIOs, and the Thirsties wraps with Kissaluvs contours are my favorite methods currently.  The Thirsties just seem to fit her best right now.  She’s pretty skinny for a baby (32nd percentile for weight, but 55th for height) and a lot of the diapers seem to have leg openings that are too big.  When we tighten them enough to fit well around the legs, they become too tight around her tummy.  I’m sure things will change as she grows, though, as they have so far.  (We liked the Proraps and BumGenius one-size pockets best when she was littler.)

Oh, what else…  Oh, we made our first real car trip with her!  We drove to my parents’ across the state, which is normally about a four hour drive.  The way there was awful.  We stopped twice to feed her, which I had expected, but then she was so unhappy most of the rest of the drive.  We ended up stopping another time so I could get in the back with her and keep her happy.  She fell asleep immediately, so I think she was just lonely back there.  The way back was great – she slept most the way – and the visit itself was wonderful!  My family is absolutely in love with her, and she seems to return the affection.  It was great having so many people around to entertain her and keep her happy, and it was like a little vacation for John and me, lol!  I think our next trip will be in Sept, when we go for a friend’s wedding.

OK, Nora just woke up from a nap and is hungry.  : )  I’ll post a pic or two really quickly, in the pictures section.  The Super Nora one is my new favorite!

Breastfeeding update

The day Eleanor was born, she BFed really well for about an hour right after the c/s.  I had plentiful colostrum, things were going very well.  Well, things took a turn!  Eleanor was really sleepy the rest of that day, though all the nurses and docs assured me this was normal and she was fine.  She woke about every four hours to eat, which was deemed good enough for those first 24 hours.  She lost 5% of her body weight in the first 24 hours, and needed to lose no more than a couple more % in the next 24 hours.  She did manage to stay just at that threshold, however her sleepiness got worse on day two: she pretty much slept from 1:30am until 6pm!  We woke her up every three hours to try to feed her, but she just wasn’t interested.  Finally, about mid-day, they brought in a pump and I was able to get some colostrum out, and we fed her that from a syringe.  Then she woke up that evening and seemed to nurse well through the night and into the next morning. 

I was hoping things were going to be fine then, but another problem cropped up: bad latch.  Every nurse who watched her latch on claimed it was great, yet I’ve been in horrible pain.  It makes no sense!  We thought maybe it was just sensitive nipples, and the pain would get better in a couple days.  By the time I was discharged, the pain was pretty bad with every latch and persisting through the feed, but Eleanor seemed to be getting enough to eat and the pain was manageable.  My milk also hasn’t come in yet, and she’s so hungry that she just chomps down on me.  I figured everything would improve when my milk finally came in. 

Then she gave me a blood blister this morning on my right which led to quite the meltdown from me (I feel like I can’t feed my baby!), and we made an appt to see a lactation consultant.  We just got back from her.  She took one look at my breasts and told me she really thought it would be best to give them a few days to heal, use a hospital-grade pump in the meantime and give her whatever I can pump, and supplement with formula as needed until we can transition her back to the breast.  She was down 12 ounces (about 11%, which is bad), though the lactation consultant remarked that she only looked a little dehydrated and we had come in in good time.  Another day or two and we might have been looking at bigger problems.  We’re using a syringe with tubing and daddy’s finger to supplement, to avoid nipple confusion issues.

I’m really bummed that we need to supplement, though I feel even worse that my baby has gone down so much in weight in such a short time.  I know I’ve done everything I can, and the LC kept telling me that, too.  She thinks the c/s is what’s causing this (both Eleanor’s sleepiness in the first, vital days for bringing the milk in, and also my body’s inability to heal any minor breast wounds while healing from the c/s, leading to more and more damage.)   She took 10mL of formula at the appt, and was so content and happy afterward.  She should be taking more than that at her age (three days at 9:23am), so it’s so sad that just that small amount was enough to make her happy.  I haven’t seen her content after a feeding from me since her first day of life! 

I hope the pumping works and my milk does eventually come in.  I also hope the pumping doesn’t hurt just as bad as having her on the breast.  It hurt quite a bit in the hospital, but I didn’t have the same amount of pain while BFing her then.  I have to say that I read everything I could find on BFing, and knew all of this could be an issue after a c/s, but I failed to anticipate just how painful it can be!  I’m over-tired and hormonal of course, like all new mothers (and fathers), and I have pain from the c/s itself to boot, but the BFing pain has been the worst.  On top of everything else, it has been almost too much to take.  I don’t think being forewarned of this would have helped, though seeing a LC earlier may have.  I had an opportunity to see one yesterday before we left, but I thought we were ok at that point, and I was so anxious to just get home with my new baby.  : (  My first mistake as a new mom, and I hope it doesn’t make BFing an impossibility now.  I’m determined to stick to it, but I can’t force my milk to come in.

Bob is here!

BFing is now not going well, and we have an appt with a lactation consultant in half an hour, so I only have time to post the same message I posted to the iVillage boards:

Bob made a surprise appearance on the morning of March 15th, and it’s a …

.!!!!!!

Here are the stats: She was born at 9:23am, weighing 6 pounds and 13.4 oz, and measuring 18.25″ long! She is beautiful and perfect!

I woke up at 2am from a dream that I was on my period and I was leaking. Of course, my water had broken! I managed to wake up in time to tell John, then run to the bathroom before making a mess of our bed. We then quickly packed some last minute stuff, called L&D, and were out the door by 2:25. I started having early ctx on the way, basically just BHs with some light menstrual cramp-type pain.

When I first checked in, they thought I would probably have a c/s within an hour. However, since the baby looked great on the monitors, my ctx were still those of very early labor, and there was another woman in the unit who was possibly headed toward an emergency C, they decided to postpone mine until 8:30. They also did another u/s just in case, and of course Bob was still breech!

Since I went through almost seven hours of labor before the c/s, of course the ctx got worse and worse. I don’t know how much I progressed since they never checked me, but I don’t think the rate my ctx were going would have made for a speedy labor. Even at that many hours into it I still wasn’t having regular ctx, though they had gotten fairly painful. I have a feeling I would have ended up getting pitocin.

Honestly the worst part was the gushing fluid: I had no idea how much there would be, and it was crazy! It felt really gross. I also found it difficult to move around for the first few hours, since they had me hooked up to fetal heart and ctx monitors, an IV for fluids and abx, plus I had to manage the darn robe, a towel between my legs, and the constantly trickling or gushing fluid. Finally the MW on call unplugged me from the monitors, got me a birthing ball, and snuck me in some ice chips to boot! I love my MWs!! The birthing ball was awesome, and really helped make the ctx more manageable.

So finally around 8:30, they walked me down to the OR. Overall, the c/s went wonderfully! Everyone was so supportive in the room, and kept commenting on how calm John and I were. They were happy and cheerful, and made it a great experience.

The spinal took a while – maybe 15 minutes – since I apparently had some swelling in my lower back, and also a very small “space” that he had trouble finding. He finally did find it and the spinal took effect almost immediately. It was the weirdest thing ever! I could feel pressure, but no pain, cold, even touch, from about mid-belly down. Mid-belly up was a gradient from feeling just the roughest touches to feeling everything again. Even the bottom half of my bbs were a little numb! I didn’t feel them put the catheter in, nor did I feel the doc start operating. Both times I only knew because someone told me.

The thing that surprised me most about the c/s was how slow the part before they took the baby out went, and how quickly the closure and cleaning up part went! I’m sure it was all mental: the ten minutes you’re waiting for your baby feel like an eternity, while the 30 minutes you’re laying there kissing and talking to your new baby feel like nothing. : ) When the first person said they saw the bottom, it was incredible. Slowly other parts were visible to various people, and then next thing I knew John was leaning over my head telling me it was a girl! My baby was finally part of the world and had an identity, and it was the most amazing I have ever felt! I teared up, of course, and craned my neck to see her the whole time they were dealing with the cord and her lungs, and wiping her off at the little warmer. She took a little bit to cry – maybe 30 seconds – as they had to suction her out. She’s not much a crier in general though, which I’m hoping lasts!

So far I’m feeling pretty good, though I don’t know how I’ll feel tomorrow: they gave me Duramorph in the spinal, which is a 24 hour morphine derivative. It takes the edge off the pain, and makes me a little tired, but I’m completely lucid. Plus I’d be tired anyway, I didn’t exactly get a good night’s sleep last night! They also have me on an IV version of a strong Ibuprofen-like drug. Since the IV comes out tomorrow, the next thing is Percocet. I hope it works as well for the pain! I already have a bit of pain at my incision site, kind of a dull aching, and I have to be careful when I laugh, cough, or move.

I’ve been able to BF successfully once, right after the surgery was completed, and with limited success a couple more times. Eleanor seems more interested in sleeping than eating today, and the nurses aren’t concerned. They want to see her eating every 2-3 hours after 24 hours after birth, but the first 24 hours they just want you to offer the breast every four hours at least, and let the baby take what they will. The nurses have been incredibly helpful with BFing, and I feel pretty confident that we’ll be able to make it work. She seems to mostly get how it works, when she’s interested. : ) I also seem to have a lot of colostrum: one of the nurse’s expressed some onto the tip, to entice Eleanor to feed, and it came out quickly and easily. She said that was a great sign. I’ve also already started to leak on the left side, which I hadn’t done during pgcy. Yay!

I am so excited and so amazed to have little Bob/Eleanor here already!! It’s been a wild ride with her, and I’m sure it will continue to be. She is the cutest baby I have ever seen, naturally, and we truly love her to pieces already. I didn’t expect to feel such an incredible bond so quickly.

Here are a couple pics: