Summer holidays are over, the PESH are bringing their bumps and baybees back to school

[TheOriginalWinkly]

Pack your giant pants in your satchel and maternity pads in your pencil case, it's the antenatal thread for BESH graduates

CRESH

Faith - pinky faithlet arrived 14th April 2013
Pinkr - suitably pinky one arrived 25th August 2013
Jethro - blue one arrived 23rd September 2013
Noks - pink one arrived 12th January 2014
Frankel - large pink one arrived 10th March 2014
Merks - pink one landed safe and sound 21st March 2014
Sinky - Stubborn blue one arrived 26th March 2014
Driz - blue one arrived 12th June 2014
Kat - pink one arrived 21st June 2014
draf - pink calf on 1st July 2014
winks - a pink one dragged out kicking and screaming on 4th July 2014
euro - a pink one in a hurry to see the world, born on 17th July 2014
dor - a pink one born at speed on 28th July 2014
ginge - completing the ESH Summer of Pink on 23rd August 2014

PESH
Buggerlugs - Buglet due 20th October
Fankle - ESHlet expected 4th January
Cunty - Minichops expected 7th February

The hags are wise. Nothing prepared me for the sheer relentlessness of these early weeks. We used to be very attached to our lie ins. Now we consider three hours together good going. I knew babies woke at night but I wasn't prepared for how hard it would be night after night.

As others have said, you just need to do what you need to to get through. Feed the baby. Look after yourself. Nothing else matters in the short term.

What's up with the boob?

Winks I'm glad mini seems better. :)

Kfzk has a stinking cold and I am dreading us all getting it.

Do you have any lansinoh? Its good stuff, it saved me whilst waiting for tongue tie snip. Obviously if latch hurts tongue tie might be the problem, worth asking about. Sometimes though it is just that their mouth is so tiny so harder to get a deep latch. This will improve as her mouth gets bigger. Does she take a very long time to feed? This is another sign that it might be tongue tie.

i think real life help is invaluable for breastfeeding problems. If her tongue is fine you might just need a bit of help with positioning her at the breast.

Everything is harder in the night! If her weight is going up you must be doing something right though, hang on in there! 30 minutes is not too long for a feed at her age. It might be worth trying the rugby ball position on the bad boob at least. I used it for the first two weeks as it seemed to make her open her mouth wider.

my baybee is hogging my side of bed and still wont bloody settle.

Yay!! Glad you feel better. Now send him off to bed for the morning so you can get more sleep this afternoon! How did the boob expressing go?

@ fanjo of doom! Sorry Bugs But that just made me chortle for a good two minutes! I'm sure it's fine, it's only been five minutes, give your fanjo a break, she's been through a lot!

Ok hags it's tassel time, 9 week scan today, all is well, growing properly and even wiggling tiny stumps, I think I may be starting to believe that I'm actually going to get a win Very weird!

Oh so add me to the list,

EDD: 06/05/15!

Eeek! Congratulations MissH!

bugs I was amazed how quickly I healed (second degree tears).

Woo hoo! Congratulations miss H! Wonderful news!

bugs was it a tear or an episiotomy? Either way in a few months it is likely to be back to normal. Everything is still a bit bruised down there at first which means it aint going to look too preety even without stitches.

If she'd gaining weight I wouldn't worry about cup feeding. Sounds like you are doing a good job to be honest.

I was really worried for ages about my stitches but they have healed fine. I am sure it is all normal.

Woo hoo, missh that is awesome news. :)

Bugs, I'm sure the fanjo will recover. It sounds like you are doing a great job on feeding.

Dried apricots and plenty of water to drink. Water is key. Try to have a glass every time you feed. That should get things moving. Beware though, I went a bit overboard on the dried fruit and ended up with the opposite problem.

Hope the rest of the night was better. We seem to have hit the four month regression early here, back to three feeds a night. Poo. Little madam slept much of the morning to make up for it. I can't do that! I was about to write that they were both asleep at the same time but I can hear her waking...

Ah yes iron tablets can be horribly constipating. Sounds like you got more sleep than we did!

Congrats MissH, great news

Well done on the sleep Bugs, make the most of it!

Interesting few days here, I got an email from my boss yesterday asking if I'd consider coming back to work 1 day a week (using my KIT day entitlement) starting next month. My maternity leave cover is leaving early to go to another job.

HWHNN and I had a lengthy chat and after some consideration, I'm going to do it. We agreed I'd only do it if we could sort out good quality childcare, I phoned the nursery that I put E's name down for and by sheer chance they have space for her on Mondays. We've done the sums and it all adds up and as my SMP was due to end at the end of November it'll mean we will be better off than we expected!

That sounds good Frank, they clearly miss you! Is it nice having HWHNN home? Is it a bit weird not having it just being you and E?

It's lovely having him at home, though still taking a bit of getting used to! Having him here to help get E ready in the morning for nursery will be useful!