• Home
  • About
  •  

    My “Mommy” Badge

    September 18th, 2008

    I was pooped, peed and spit-up on (can you say trifecta?) in the span of 30 minutes this morning. My reaction? I was too tired to care and went back to bed.

    I think I’ve officially earned my “mommy” badge, yes?


    Awww!

    September 17th, 2008

    We got this in the mail today.

    It’s from my office. Our HR team (gets notified of the birth) and they sent us this little bib. Small gesture, but darn nice!

    Cute, no?


    No, it’s not all great!

    September 17th, 2008

    Do you find that when you ask the parents of a newborn how it’s going, you get a very generic “It’s fine!” or “We’re doing great!” response? Really? Are those families really doing that wonderfully? Can everything really be that easy for them?

    I ask because I find myself doing it too… when things aren’t 100% fine or 100% great. Now, don’t get me wrong — we are doing pretty well, but we have some hiccups too. I realize that some parents would love to have the sleeping issues we’re dealing with, and I am grateful that we don’t have bigger fish to fry.

    So why then, the short “no problems here” response?

    Is it because we’re afraid others will think we’re bad parents if we’re honest?

    Is it because we don’t want to appear pessimistic, or ungrateful for the children we are blessed with?

    or Is it because we’re afraid to scare of other potential parents?

    For me, it’s mostly because I don’t feel like getting into the details with whomever asks at the time. I guess I need to come up with a set of short (but honest) responses. Things like “We had a rough night last night, but we’re getting through it”, or “This current growth spurt is hard but we’re managing”. What do you think? At least that way, I’m truthful about what’s really going on. This way if you ever hear me say “It’s great!”, feel free to challenge me and call me a liar 🙂

    Oh… and in terms of how it’s going so far: G is growing well (above his birth-weight in record time); S and I are tired and sleepy; G still cries (but less now that we know how to comfort him better) and things are improving.


    Sleep deprived couple seeking sleep dust

    September 13th, 2008

    You know the boob faerie? The one I was feeling neglected by? Yeah, we’re totally squared away there.

    It’s the sleep faerie that we’re having issue with these days.

    G is now two weeks old (man, does time fly!) and in those two weeks I think he and the sleep faerie have had some falling out. Most likely it happened on the ride home from the hospital. He slept like a log for the first two days. While in the hospital in general we got pretty decent sleep (even in 2 hour intervals), but over the last week he’s taken to waking up in the middle of his nap, about 4-5 times a day and wailing up to an hour an a half to exhaustion… both his and ours. It seems like little we do comforts him, and there are only two things that work: 1) wrapping him up in a tiny ball and carrying him around in the Moby wrap; and 2) having him sleep in a vertical orientation… typically over our shoulder.

    We’re diligently tracking his wailing periods, being careful to distinguish between the occasional baby whimper and the heart-breaking, full-on wailing spell. We write down when it starts and how long it goes for. S and I are data people. We like numbers, charts and pretty graphs. However, so far we see no pattern to G’s crying. Hopefully, our pediatrician, however, will. All our pretty data along with our daily feeding/diaper tracking will all be presented at our next appointment. Hopefully he’ll have some wise words of wisdom that go beyond “It’s probably just colic!”.

    S’ sister gave us some sage words of advice a few months ago: “If it seems easy, you’re probably doing it wrong!”. Well, with all this crying, I admit, I AM looking for the easy fix. Colic can take months to resolve, and the idea of weeks and months of this exhausts me just thinking about it. I’ve caved and we started trying the Mylicon drops. If it’s gas (one of my suspicions), hopefully this will resolve it.

    However, even despite the daily crying sessions, G is growing very well. At 2 weeks, he’s not only reclaimed his birth-weight (6lb 6oz), but now surpassed it, weighing in at 6lb 11.5oz. He’s also now 19.5 inches long. Our little boy is growing, which is awesome. His cord stump fell off earlier this week too, which is giving us a wide range of adorable onsie clothing options. Pics of fasion show to come soon. Promise!

    PS. Oh, and as a personal note, I have now lost exactly half of my pregnancy weight gain. I have a pudgy belly, but I think I look pretty good for a mom of a 2-week old. I haven’t needed to take any pain meds in half a week, and I was only taking the Motrin anyway. Even before I left the hospital I had my full range of motion, and next week I’m going to start some light cardio work on our elliptical.


    What smells?

    September 13th, 2008

    Ok, there is something I just have to share with all the new moms out there. It took me awhile to figure out and at the off-chance it will drive anyone else as nuts as it drove me, I’m sharing my discoveries here.

    For the longest time, starting about the 4th or 5th day of G’s life, whenever I would nurse him at the end I would smell this awful, foul stench. I smelled his breath, my own, I even shoved my nose to his diaper, my boob (as close as my neck would bend) and I just couldn’t figure it out. It drove me crazy. I would ask S if he smelled it to, only to negative responses. I even asked the pediatrician about it. He said some women are sensitive to breastmilk and don’t get along with the smell.

    But that wasn’t it. I smelled my breastmilk, and it smelled nothing like what was eating at me.

    Until I figured it out — the cord!!! That little rotting piece of flesh hanging out in front of G’s belly was the culprit! One whiff of that (and why I hadn’t done it earlier I dunno) and the case was closed. Whenever I would nurse, since G’s belly would be pressed up against my body, the smell would just collect and as soon as I would pull him away would shoot straight up my nostrills.

    So all you ladies awaiting the birth of your babies. When that smell hits you — now you too will know what’s to blame.

    Oh… and with this, I won’t be seeking a career change to the morgue anytime soon!


    Eating woes

    September 9th, 2008

    Bon soir monsieur! So glad to see you again. We have a delectable menu for you tonight. For your apetizer course may I recommend Boobie Number One? Our special entre tonight is Boobie Number Two. Could I, perhaps get you started with a drink?

    ***

    I feel like today has been the first day since G got home that we’ve been more in… control. I feel like I’ve finally got more time away from the nursery than in it and finally getting stuff done. I sorted and folded a pile of clothes today that have been waiting on me since Wednesday and I feel the accomplishment pride of climbing mount Everest. I’m hoping tomorrow and going forward will continue to be as good.

    A big reason for all this is the schedule we’ve been trying to put G on. After several days of just frantic 2 hour feedings we finally sat down and put together a schedule. Now we at least know when the next feeding should be and can plan around it. We’ve been able to get two 4-hr spaced out feedings each night, each taking a shift with G. We’ve been able to get about 5 hours of sleep that way and it’s been good. Last night we even tried the mid-night on-demand approach. G slept for 4 hours straight before waking us up for his next munch session. It was beautiful! Here’s hoping for another one of those.

    Feeding US on the other hand has been interesting. The heat spell we just had, had the wonderful side effect of a brown out, followed by a black out. The brown-out had the wonderful side effect of burning out the control panel on our fridge. That in turn defrosted everything in our freezer, and made our fridge nothing more than a big honkin’ cooler sitting in our kitchen. We lost a bunch of food. A lot of the stuff my mom made for us before leaving is gone. The small milk stash I started for G is also gone. This on it’s own is seriously frustrating, but the fiasco we had with GE took the cake. What distinguishes a good product from a bad product isn’t just how often (if) it breaks, but how the company handles the situation. In our case customer service was simply terrible. I swear S was about to have an aneurysm dealing with a rude, inflexible and incompetent rep. At least our story had somewhat of a happy ending. Not able to resolve our issue with GE, $285 and two hours later we had a working fridge again after calling a local company. Needless to say, we’ll be having serious considerations before buying another GE appliance.

    On the bonus side, I should get props for quick cooking in a desperate situation. I rescued 6 chicken breasts and half a pound of ground meat through Chicken Parmesan and a quickly thrown together pasta sauce. I didn’t even look up any recipes. I just opened up my fridge and ran with any ingredient I could find. Two menus, 1 hour of cooking… all while G slept. See, I told you I’m starting to regain my control again 🙂


    And the winner is…

    September 6th, 2008

    My mom!!! No joke and definatelly no nepotism here.

    We had 42 entries into our Baby Pool from all over the world. The closest across all questions was in fact my mom. Her strategy? Apparently, to enter in the stats of her birth with me. I guess that works!!!

    The scoring process was a reverse point system. It went like this: the multiple choice questions you either got right or not. If you got it right you got 0 points, if you got it wrong you got 1 point. For the questions on dates and weights you got a point for each day/lb/oz you were away from the actual. The person with the fewest points won. It was actually a close call. 2nd place was only 1 point away from first, and two people tied for second.

    If you’re interested how close YOU got, drop me a line and I’ll let you know your rank.

    Congrats Mom!


    Burping is hard!

    September 5th, 2008

    Why can’t I burp my child?

    I’ve got diaper duty down. I’m nursing well. I’ve got swaddling down to a science and I can make the most perfect baby burrito, but burping? I suck at it! Over the shoulder, across the lap, sitting up: all fail me. S on the other hand gets great belches.

    Is it a guy-to-guy thing?

    What am I missing?


    Week one

    September 5th, 2008

    G is one week old today.

    We got home Tuesday. A big part of me didn’t want to. Most people around us couldn’t wait to get home, and there I was wishing it was day 1 all over again.

    It was nice being in an enclosed space for awhile. The rest of the world was shut out and the presence of knowledgeable nurses was my security blanket. I had to hold back the tears that choked me in my throat walking from our room to the elevator after we were discharged.

    Being home, honestly, has been much harder than I thought it would be. Here we have to worry about laundry, food, groceries, trash in the little time we have in between feedings. My family arrived the day we got home from the hospital – something I didn’t want before G was born (S & I wanted to get G’s routine down beforehand so that we’d know where help was needed), but now I’m glad it worked out that way. My mom has been in charge of cooking, my sister in charge of shopping, and my dad’s strength’s came in when my computer melted the moment we got home.
    G is a completely different baby here from the one in the hospital room. The “routine” (HA!) that I thought we had worked out in our little secluded haven just isn’t working here. G went from a baby content and sleeping to his bassinette to one that prefers being helps and starts fussing when put down. A big part of this, I think was my fault. I was feeding him on a strict two hour schedule (like I had in the hospital), hoping for a few 4-hr stretches at night so S and I could get some rest in shifts. G repaid me that first night by having a melt-down. Since then S and I have frantically been reading and trying out more flexible approaches to the feeding schedule. That and we’ve been using the Moby wrap at night. Honestly, that 20ft long piece of fabric has been our life-saver. We load G in there at night and can sleep in our glider without worrying about dropping him. It’s not a long term strategy, but it’s gotten us through the last two nights pretty successfully. Right now the Moby wrap is worth its length in gold for me. I’m even thinking about ordering a second, for fear that if G pees on it one night (yes, we’re discovering diaper malfunctions) we’d be hosed.

    Nursing has been going really well for us. I never thought I’d say that. The boob fairy has now also gotten a little vengeful – I think she’s pissed that I complained about her work a few months ago and has paid me several visits. The bra’s I bought now longer fit. I’m now up two sizes from my pre-pregnancy size and I think I might be another cup size on the way up too. Whereas I’m enjoying my new curves, my wallet is not appreciating having to purchase nursing bras I can’t return (I now have 3 unworn, size-too-small bras hanging out in my closet).
    Anyway, back to the nursing thing – G is gaining his weight back already, and I’m pretty pleased about that. Our doctor’s appointment yesterday told us he’s doing well and is a healthy little guy.

    The docs visit was interesting. It was our first trip outside of the house, which alone was OK, except that G really didn’t like being stripped down to a diaper only. It was cold and he was getting hungry. He peed on S in revenge. We went through the extra outfit we had in our diaper bag. Following the doc’s office fiasco we did yet another trip to Babies R Us. Now that we’re home, we’re seeing items that we could use more of, so we had a little shopping spree. G was so worn out at that point he slept like a champ for the rest of the day.

    In other news, my belly has really shrunk down. I now look 20 weeks pregnant (vs. 30-some when we left the hospital). This makes me ridiculously sad: I really enjoyed the last 40 weeks and loosing the belly is another reminder that I’m not pregnant anymore. I’m working through it, but it’s rough.

    Speaking of which – post partum hormones? Holy cow (and I don’t mean G in his cow outfit)!!! I thought I did very well with pregnancy hormones, but I’ve cried more in the last week than I probably did over the last year (infertility treatment included). That’s some strong stuff right there. If you could bottle up these dudes, you’d never have to worry about interrogation techniques ever again. 1 dose of this stuff and even your burliest dude would be crying for his mommy.

    Next up? Figuring out the winner of our Baby Pool.


    It’s not my fault!

    September 3rd, 2008

    If G ends up growing up needing tons of therapy, it’s not my fault! It’s the clothes’ fault. I mean, how can you possibly resist this?

    Say “Moo”!