Due August '07 Part 5 - Whizzing into our third Trimester !

[tokentotty]

Hellooooo !!

Morning all. Ceolas I am so impressed at your being up for number four! And a bit envious as we will just be grateful if we manage to give our little one a little brother or sister in the near future.

How is everyone? I have nothing to say and will probably just lurk today. Tis nice to have your company on this sunny [guffaw] Friday.

Hi all. It looks horrible outside but it's very humid so I'm extremely hot. The air con is this building is awful. It tends to work based on the outside temperature and doesn't take into account all the people and pcs that heat the inside.

I'm another one who had a baby who would only sleep on me. She's 2.2 now and we've only been able to put her down to sleep (after she's gone to sleep - she won't go on her own) in the last few months. She's always refused to sleep in the cot on her own when put down awake and won't go to sleep at night on her own without screaming. I always thought it was something I'd done wrong but it looks like that's just the way she is. I'm really hoping for a good sleeper this time round. I didn't enjoy the baby stage with dd because I couldn't ever put her down to do anything after she got past the newborn, sleeps all day stage. Like mum2george said, it would be nice to be able to have a shower, eat, even do the washing without having to wait for dh to come home.

I'm afraid I'm having a duvet day.

I was up half the night with rotten heartburn and decided that as I get no extra rest at the w/e when dh is here, I would actually take a day off sick.

So... I've just dried my hair after having a long relaxing soak - shaved my legs for probably the last time as i could only just get to them . And now I'm going to see what delights are in my fridge.

GillL sorry to hear that - you have been hot all week and I have been sitting here freezing. I was joking to my BF that our new office suffers from bitter "coastal winds" being just on the Thames. Have you tried using a fan? My secretary and I used to share one last summer and it at least moved air around.

All this talk about non-sleeping babies is making me want to do a token totty effort of "la la la la" with fingers in ears. The one thing we have spent serious money on is kit for sleeping - slings, hammock (not the Ambi though) basket, cot... My partner is very anti co-sleeping but mostly because our cats have shared my bed/sofa and every other soft surface in the house for far too long and he worries about it causing respiratory problems for LO. I too have a slight horror of finding flea bites on my baby. Any other cat owners have any advice other than to throw away this mattress and spend yet more baby money replacing it?
We watched one of those home birth programmes last night and that couple actually had both cats in the living room while she was giving birth there. We were a bit .

[waves to growingbagpuss and thumbs up to having a slacker day]

I'm loath to say it..... but i'll say it any way...... we followed a routine for ds - not from day 1, but by 6 weeks we had strict bedtime, and we began to leave him to cry - especially if it was a going to sleep cry (1st timers -odd as it sounds you really CAN tell the difference) - when he was about 9 weeks we started using the Gina Ford book... i never stuck to it rigidly, but I do believe it made a difference.

Now maybe he would have been a sleeper anyway - but at 2.5 he has his lunch and says "time for snooze", walks upstairs, has a wee, and goes to sleep for 2 hours. I can't believe he would have been this good if we hadn't stuck to a routine.

I know it's not the answer to everything, and it doesn't suit everyone - it worked for me because being depressed I really needed the routines to keep me going. I did used to get a bit (!!) stressed if things went awry and he didn't get to sleep at the "right" times, but this time round I know LO will survive - and yes - the Gina Ford book is out, and ready.......

Don't all hit me at once..

I'm outta here too - seeing Betty this afternoon but am bound to back on waffling later.....

Bagpuss, My mum just sent me the new GF book so have been reading it all morning. After all the stuff I read about it on here I expected it to be pretty militant stuff, but (maybe bc it's the 2nd "new" edition) it seems pretty common sense and felxible to me!? Was the first edition more srtict?
So far it seems to be constantly repeating that the routines are a framework and you need to use your intuition to make things work for you and your baby.
Seems i'm reading a dif book to the one everyone seems to go on (and on and on) about!?

Ah yes, Kite, my house is a bit of a zoo too... This is terrible to admit, but our dog will get up onto the bed (and under the covers!) halfway through the night and the cat joins us in the early hours. We had such good intentions to wean them off and ban them from the bedroom, sofa etc waaay before the baby is due, but it hasn't happened yet. We are just both terrible suckers for a cute face and I find having them about so relaxing. Have visions of future Sunday mornings in bed spent with dog, cat and baby, with me squidged to the side of the bed and DH taking up most of the space as usual .

Needless to say, my mother and anyone else that realises is horrified. She keeps telling me I need to redecorate and disinfect a room in the house ready for my planned home birth. (To which I reply, 'have you seen the state of the loos/bathroom in a hospital recently?').

MyWeeGirl, I asked my doctor the same thing (about the measuring thing and what is fat v what is baby) and he said that it was really only of use as an indicator that the baby was growing at a good rate - not really indicative of how big it was. So only useful for comaparing your current measurement with the last. Does that make sense?

Annie, I hope you have a big bed!? sounds great to me. Wish I could have a dog/cat, but we're renting, so not an option.

An ex-colleague gave me the Gina Ford book and I read it but I never really used it other than a reference if we were having problems. I'm not a routine person and that's probably why dd isn't either. The thought of getting up at 6:30am every morning just to keep to a 7-7 sleep pattern is not appealing, especially when you've been up half the night with a hungry baby. Dd has never really slept more than 10 hours per night anyway.

I've always been a fan of co-sleeping, even since the beginning. If it means I'm going to get more sleep then it's fine with me. I don't think it gets babies into a bad habit as dd only wakes in the night sometimes.

Lol about your dh taking up most of the bed Annie. I have the same problem and normally end up perching at the edge while dd tries to lay her face on mine!

I think mine GF book was the "new" version too - I only ever managed the 6.30 getting up thing once DS was sleeping through!!

Most of the time he would naturally wake then anyway.

I do swear by the blackout curtain thing though -we have a length of black fabric on elastic, with safety pins at either end, and take it with us almost everywhere. It does work and esp when ds was smaller - equally now, he will sleep anywhere -but i think that is down to having good sleep routines.

We did co-bedding too - not v often coz he was such a HUGE LUMP that if he slept on my chest (I could never have him next to me i was scared of squashing or suffocating him) I woke up with terrible back and neck ache.

Annie75, we too had intentions of "weaning" the cats out of bedroom but it is hard enough for me to sleep at the moment without taking away the soporific sound of my cat purring so although I feel a bit guilty I am afraid it will be cold turkey for them. I am having regular toxo screening - I ask for it with all my bloodwork so I feel that so far I am prtecting the LO as much as I can.

Wish your Mum had seen some of these home birth programmes. Honestly we have all been congratulating ourselves on our homes being less germ-infested than local hospitals but others doing home births seem to have less issues on that front.

Myweegirl, my mw also said that the only usefulness of measuring is to see how much LO has grown since last measurement. So far we have been a cm or 2 under the number of weeks gone, but noone has been alarmed or said s/he is a small baby because s/he is def growing at the right rate.

Afternoon all
It's boiling in Devon today- too hot to sit in the garden
Re the routine thing- some of my friends are completely anti and some completely for. The one thing the routine ones all seem to day is get the baby up at 7am however horrific it is. I've been reading 'the' routine book (not sure if allowed to talk about it!) and was also surprised how OK it seemed given what some friends say. I bet all my intentions will completely fall by the wayside anyway!

Same here Kite, I measure about a week small, but rate of growth is on target, so nothing to worry about. Can't say I'd be dissapointed not to have to push out a whopper anyway!!

kiteflying/sweetydarling - that's interesting to know - thank you!

i've just been watching pregnancy programmes on living 2 (i'm supposeed to be working but having an easy day). one was a home birth (with cats and children running round). and the mum wanted the placenta and umbilical cord left attached to the baby until it fell off naturally (it did this after 5 days i think they said). they washed the placenta and then rubbed salt and something else into it to keep it from smelling...don't think i'll be oding this!

the other programme had a few tips -

• buy the thick, cheap as chips sanitary pads as the plastic backed ones don't let the perinuem breathe
• start perineal massage - wtih sweet almond oil to help prevent tears and prepare the perimeun for stretching

I don't think the size thing measn a lot - I've always measured exactly right and still managed to "pop" out a 9lb-er!! I agree with everyone who is saying it is relative - as long as growth is steady and it doesn't look like mum is developing diabetes they're not too fussed if the bean is a bit big - oh i guess it's also relative to your height/ shoes size, pelvis size. I am 5'10', size 8 shoes, and skinny, but generously hipped - so apparently my shape is perfect for hueg babies. Lucky me.

One of my v good friends is tiny, and after an emergency section for ds1, she had an elective for ds2 - hope I haven't scared anyone!!

When are you supposed to start the perenial massage?

one said from 5 months - but i've read in other places about 34 weeks...

Our cats aren't even allowed in the bedroom during the day. They would get up to all sorts of trouble. One of them is sick regularly so they are shut in the kitchen (where they can get out of the cat flap in the back door) so we don't have to clean dried up cat sick from the living room carpet or furniture in the morning. Also, they fidget so much that they would wake us up when they got on the bed in the night.

I wouldn't let the cats in the bedroom if I get the home birth I want. Based on last time they would get on my nerves - I didn't want anyone touching me and pushed the midwife away when she tried to massage my back. I would definitely be giving all the surfaces a thorough clean with Dettol.

To confirm - they're only shut in the kitchen at night.

Not sure if I could FIND my perineum if i tried - it's bad enough trying to get underwear on!

the other key thing my cousin recommended before I had ds was laxatives!! Prune juice, prunes, whatever your poison - but you SOOOOOO do not wnat to be remotely bunged up after the birth.

GillL, you know Dettol is poisonous to cats don't you? Please don't take that as critical - tis not meant to be so.

Lol Bagpuss, I fell over putting my knickers on this morning - luckily only onto the bed!