Good morning all, congratulations to all the new mums - hope everything is going OK for you Susie - sounds like you had a pretty horrendous time of it, although so glad you and Sabela have come out on the other side safe and sound. Both my brother and my sister were born in Bronglais - nice hospital I can't rememeber if I posted my birth story here or not - if I haven't, I'll post it on the post-natal thread so people here can have a look if they want. Think there's a lot of valuable info in birth stories - I wish I'd read more of them!
Ben is an absolute charmer, and so chilled out! Nothing fazes him except breastfeeding, which we're really struggling with at the moment. It doesn't help that he appears to have a tongue tie, but because he's been feeding so poorly, when he gets hungry he fusses with his hands and his head so much that he just can't latch on at all, which increases the frustration for all of us. Ironically, if he does latch on, he often falls asleep quickly afterwards as he's so exhausted from lack of food and trying to feed. Last night was horrendous to say the least - he'd had a half hour feed at about 1pm, then in-effective feeds at 4pm, 7pm and 11pm (i.e. wouldn't stay on the boob for more than 5 minutes, not interested in feeding, giving the "I'm full" cues after 10 minutes etc etc). Come 3am he was absolutely frantic - starving hungry, shivering like mad because he had no energy to keep him warm. The hungrier he gets the more difficult it is to feed him as he fusses so much with his hands and his mouth and frantically tries to latch on to anything but my boob (DH's fingers, neck, his sleeve, his own fingers, his bottom lip, just not my nipple!). We had to get some food down him so ended up expressing some milk and bottle feeding him. Although I was reluctant to do so, it had to be done, and was the best thing we could have done. He took the bottle absolutely fine, no fussing or spitting it out. He was absolutely ravenous, and drank 5oz before finally admitting he was full. My worry was that for the next feed he'd be the same unless we gave him the bottle again, but although it took some perserverence, he did feed a fair amount this morning, and it was certainly easier than any of the feeds yesterday. I guess it may just be that we have to give him a "top-up" bottle feed every now and again to actually allow him to BF the rest of the time. Hopefully until we get the tongue-tie sorted anyway.
Ooh that was a long 'un! I really would recommend that if you don't already have one, get a breast pump (you'll need it whether you intend to bottle/express feed or not just to relieve the pressure on your bursting norks!) and a microwave steriliser. Because you can guarantee that it will be silly o'clock if things do go wrong, and all three of us were in tears at 4am this morning, and I don't know what we'd've done if we couldn't have given him that feed.
Other than that saga, everything's going fine! Feeling a bit more human now, although fanjo still extremely sore! Apologies if TMI, but had my first post-labour poo, and it really wasn't as bad as I'd expected. Just make sure you drink loads of fluid, and what worked for me was a huge bowl of bran flakes every morning!
Just a couple of tips as well - make sure for the 3rd stage of labour (placenta delivery and general fiddling about down there) you let them give you pain relief, because it damn well hurts, and also ask for some pain relief for afterwards when they send you up to the ward because you will be smarting, and it's not something they seem to offer as standard. I was given co-codamol an hour after the birth which was pretty much the only thing that enabled me to have the courage to go for a wee afterwards.
This is going to be a monster post, as I've still got stuff I want to say before I forget! One thing is that although obviously babies change your life completely, so many people gave me the impression that we'd never be able to watch a film or cook a meal properly. You can, no problems, you just have to be flexible. So far we've been out shopping, watched several films, had visitors, messed about on the computer, had a long bath etc. What has changed is that we can't be as spontaneous, and we have to be flexible, especially if what we want to do takes longer than an hour or so. I'll probably be made to eat my words in a few weeks, but certainly at the moment it's manageable. Just make sure your DPs/DHs are very much on your side!!
The other thing is that the cats really aren't a problem at all. The first night was a bit stressful for them as there was a bit of crying that they didn't understand and obviously as far as they were concerned, a new alien in the house. 3 days later though, they've completely got used to him, will occasionally peep in his moses basket if it's on the floor or settee just to have a look, and will fuss around us if he's crying, but other than that, it's back to normal for them. There's been no aggression, or being territorial, just mild bewilderment
Right, off to the doctor's at 2pm for his second check, and need to feed me and him before we go Sympathy to those overdue - your time will come rest assured! And all the SPD / night time loo visits, aching hips, indigestion and heartburn etc will stop almost immediately once you've had the little 'un. The only niggle I've had post birth (other than sore fanjo and feeling like I've run a marathon) is really bad sciatica in my right hip/pelvis. Will mention it to the doctor today, hopefully some excercises I can do to alleviate it.