#8 Another Week

Snippets from September 2009

The little man is asleep in my arms at the moment, but is still in that beginning “make or break” stage so I’ll hold him a little while longer before putting him in his swing. During the week now, I don’t bother getting dressed until about an hour before I need to leave for work in the afternoon. I used to get dressed in the morning when I woke up, but then I always ended up having to change due to all the baby spit and milk and whatnot. It’s just not worth it and it just makes my laundry load increase. Trust me, with Jay there is quite enough washing to do without that, thank you!

So my gorgeous little man will be exactly 3 months old on Friday. Can you believe how quickly he is growing? Not a day goes by when I don’t notice him growing in some way. And then yesterday for the first time during tummy time he held himself right up on his elbows and turned his head all around taking in the world around him. I was so excited and when I showed Greg the photos I’d taken he was excited, too, so that night after changing his diaper Greg gave him tummy time again and then took a little video of him holding himself up (and even pushing himself up higher and straightening his elbows). He also pushes out with his legs and I don’t think it’ll be that much longer before he’ll be pulling himself forward. It was so cute. Afterwards, we put him in his jumperoo for a while and even in that we noticed a change – he is actually starting to get the hang of jumping and he is able to “do” more with the toys – spin things and touch things and so on.

As I mentioned to you before, I really think the timing of your visit was quite perfect. I was already in some sort of routine so things didn’t feel totally out of control and I’m sure you didn’t feel like you were intruding at all either. Also, when you first arrived he was at that stage where he was awake for longer periods, but not really that aware of things. He couldn’t smile or play with toys or anything and yet you couldn’t just put him down anywhere because he’d get very upset and start crying. I think you were the first one who got him to lie down on the bed next to you and have him be fine for a while. Now he can stay like that for quite a while and it’s great. I just prop him up with some pillows and play with him like that. It beats carrying him around all the time. I can even do some planning by dividing my attention between him and writing. If I put him in the swing, I attach the ball from his little gym and he is quite happy to amuse himself for a while. It definitely helps me feel more sane being able to put him somewhere and know he won’t immediately start crying, but that rather he’ll be fascinated by the toys even if it’s just for a short while. Greg just loves the jumperoo and the way we can have our hands free, but still interact with him so fully.

After he takes a bath his hair always stands up and if you push it into a mohawk it stays like that! I really enjoy that time with him after his bath. I talk to him and play with him and let him listen to some songs. That’s when he has tummy time, too, and I always get lots and lots of smiles. He is also definitely putting on weight. He has the chubby thighs and arms now and I’ve had to put aside a lot of onesies that are too small for him. The other day I took out that first one he ever wore and held it up against him. I can’t believe he was ever that tiny. Now I’ve noticed that a lot of ones that were fitting him well are starting to get really snug. I started using the onesies that Annie got me in LA (they’re all 9-12 months) and they fit! I mean they’re still a little loose, but he looks comfortable (if I can put it that way). Luckily, we still have a lot of onesies and there is always that cheap store just up the road so I can easily get more if I need to.

Sleep-wise he was doing very well and had pushed it up to 6 and a half to seven hours as his longest stretch and then another 2 – 3 hours after a feeding, but we moved his crib into the bedroom again the day before yesterday. I want him to start sleeping in there at night for that first stretch. When he wakes up and feeds and then goes back to sleep, I just keep him with me, but I do want him to start associating the crib with night sleep. To be honest, I actually found it a little hard to go to sleep without him that first night and almost gave in and just let him sleep with me (I mean he was fast asleep so didn’t care, but as a mommy I felt sad without him). Anyway, I stopped myself and I guess we’ll just see how it goes. The first night his longest stretch was 3 and a half hours and last night it went up to 4 and a half.

To accommodate the crib and make things more comfortable, Greg and I switched sides and we moved that white thing that was against the window to the foot of the bed. It actually looks rather nice and now the bathroom door isn’t blocked by the huge crib. It was funny because the other night Jay was sleeping so I just asked Greg to watch him while I took a shower. When I was done and walked into the room, Greg had Jay on his chest (just like I let him lie on me) and so Greg joked that we’d switched sides and now he was the mom. So I scratched my crotch, handed him the breast pump and said, “Well then you’re going to need this for your 4am feeding!” Haha!

Lately I’m managing to breastfeed him for way longer in the mornings and sometimes even around noon or at night when I get back from work and it’s all thanks to Greg! I don’t know how he even thought of it, but during one of the many times when I was struggling to breastfeed Jay and he was super unhappy with the holes being punched into the back of his throat, Greg suddenly asked if I’d ever tried nipple shields. I had a pack in the drawer because everyone had told me I’d get cracked sore nipples (never happened at all thankfully), so they were just lying there unopened. He said that maybe it would work because the milk would first hit the silicone before moving through the holes. I sterilized them right away and used them that night and so far they seem to do the trick! He doesn’t like to start out with them, so what I do is I let him feed till I feel that first letdown. As soon as it starts, I unlatch him, put on the shield and then pop him back on. It has worked like charm so far. Just this morning he fed for almost an hour and again this afternoon without any trouble. It just makes the whole session that much calmer. And the weird thing is that I have NEVER seen this suggestion on any of the websites I looked at that discussed things you could do to help with this problem. I went to the breastfeeding forum on the website I frequent and told them there, but I don’t think this problem is that common. Only one woman said she’d experienced that and was going to try it. The others just said that was good to know in case it ever happened to them or someone they knew. One woman downright annoyed me by saying, “Well Dearie, that’s the first time I’ve heard of too much milk being a problem. I must have that then cuz I can pump 5 ounces in 5 minutes, but my little guy sure aint complaining.” I sent a rather pissy reply saying that if her son wasn’t complaining then she definitely DID NOT have this problem and was simply blessed with a lot of milk and did not have excessive letdown, that if she DID have this problem, she’d know it! Geez, I can’t stand people like that. Online there are a few of us that have breastfeeding issues and we call those kinds of women “lactavists”. Honestly they’re quite terrifying and refuse to acknowledge these problems as real things.

Okay, let me love you and leave you. Baby is awake and I think it’s time for him to do a stint in his jumperoo after I change his diaper.

Lots of love

Em x