The CRESH Creche and Spa - future home of all ESH

[Muser]

I liked the CRESH acronym more than FESH so have used it. Welcome all ESH to your final stop on the journey. Rest your aching lady bits, try one of the many gin based cocktails, and try to molest the gorgeous waiting staff.

No idea how I tell the difference Cunty. All I know is she goes head bobbing nuts and/or screams the place down. If I can't get her to take a dummy I'm not sure how I break her of the habit.

Anyway, that's her only just woken up. 10-6am is alright by me.

Ah she obviously luffs her mum :-) it gets a bit easier once they can be routinely distracted by things.

I am an idiot.

Went out last night. Yes I did. Stupidly did not express when got home. MB had his bedtime feed from the stash in the freezer. Woke up at six this morning in agony. Rock hard boob. Painful too. Got up to express. Got a measly 3oz in an hour and it still hurts.

What to do? Shower and massage. Keep feeding. Anything else?

Classic man behaviour last night, whilst I'm out I get a text saying MB won't drink his milk and HI asked what should he do? FFS!!! The answer to this is HI needs to take care of MB a bit more. So am booking a whole 24hrs away leaving him in charge!

Good idea Silv - check yourself into a Spa hotel a la erm...who was it?

Sounds like you're doing all the right stuff. Is your pump working properly? Took me 40 mins to express 1/2 an ounce last night, wasn't engorged either so was a bit worried. Twiddled around with the valve and membrane and hey presto - my nip was halfway up the tube and got 5oz out in about a minute.

Please medee, seriously, if there is anything we can do please don't hesitate to ask. :)

I think it was fanny who fucked off and left her "man" holding the metaphorical reins.

Formula does not make baybees grown horns.

Formula does not lead to horns. I'm not sure it would help though as I do think a lot of our evening routine is about comfort. When I've done an expressed bottle she has still required boob to fall asleep.

But today we buy a cot and mobile and perhaps the mobile will distract her and help her fall asleep.

Medee how are you all today. Hoping your gorgeus girl is doing well.

I do have some questions with which I shall bombard the thread...

Q1 I think she has reflux. The consultant mentioned something about it being a common accompaniement (I didn't really register it as I didn't think she had any signs of it, so I'm not sure how the two go hand in hand) and looking at her over the last couple of evenings, and reading up in WTE The First Year it seems likely. Does anyone have any experience of this and what did you do? Other than lots of holding upright to try to burp her (v difficult when she gets very squirmy) and giving her comfort, not sure what else to do. Should the feeding patterns be lots of short feeds, or fewer longer feeds. WTETFY suggests a dummy, which leads me to..

Q2 Any dummy recommendations for breastfed babies? We're planning on introducing her to expressed milk by bottle in the next week or two but she has had a couple of bottles already in her life, in NICU, so I'm not overly worried about nipple confusion. Nonetheless, don't want to cause us any problems.

Q3 Since that very first night home when she didn't waken to feed, I have been setting my alarm so that she doesn't go more than 4 hours in the night without a feed. Reading a bit last night, it clicked that perhaps she could go longer, and last night I let her go another hour before waking her to feed. Part of the problem is my boobs wake me up louping. Should I just gradually increase the interval by half hours till she wakes me? How long should a month old be going in the night? And is the answer to Q3 affected by the answer to Q1?

(I really should start a new thread for each of these! PS, has anyone else noticed how shit the index is in WTETFY? Reflux isn't under R but under G for Gastrosomething or other, and references to quantity of expressed milk to give are in two different places in the book, neither of which is indexed)

Jeez, enormo-post!

She's doing really well today, Muse. Fed well at 4am, and again at 7.30am and is now snoozing.

Glad she's doing well Medee. The only one of those questions I know anything about is dummies. TinyNeph and most of my NCT group use Mam dummies. They are the kind KateBob gave an initial suck of. She couldn't figure out the Tommee Tippee at all.

meds I can't help with BF issues, but Squeaks had nasty reflux from about 3 weeks until she could sit up. Thorough winding, sitting up after feeds etc helps, but the best thing was getting infanct gaviscon on prescription. If you are BFing, it will have to be given after feeds - which isn't easy with cluster feeding etc. It comes as powders which you make into a paste. You could syringe it in. It made my switch to bottle feeding easier because you can mix it with the milk and give as part of the feed. I spent so many hours back rubbing...

I hope it's a short-lived thing for EA - but there are plenty of ways to make it easier. I would see doc if you think you need help to control it.

Squeaks wasn't BF beyond 7 weeks, but she started with the dinky TTippee dummy, but hated the larger TTs. She now adores Boots own ones (very like MAM) and hates any curved orthodontic ones! We really need to get her off them - but I think her starting to talk might help for waking hours. She spent her first half hour this morning practising saying "da da da da da" very purposely. It used to be "ada" but today you could really hear that she was forcing out the D. She's asleep now, but has been at it all morning, to her father's delight!

As with colic, I found tilting the head end of the Moses Basket/cot up on books helps. Also helps when they have colds as I helps the fluids drain in the right direction.

Re nightine bfing! I did demand feeding others wake the babies. Guess depends on what suits you/baby. Some nights I'd have two hourly wake ups others 4-5 it just depends.

Hey, Meds. No experience of reflux here, but I have heard that feeding "upright" can help. I occasionally do it with Berwhale when my wrists give out from heaving the little porker around the place. Lean back and rest baby against stomach and let her head tilt backwards and upwards to get to nipple. www.kellymom.com/babyconcerns/reflux.html explains better.

Tbh, I wouldn't let her go longer than four hours without a feed at the moment. Berwhale has just started to naturally go a bit longer at night, but I don't know what the deal would be in your situation. Might be worth asking your specialist nurse? After sleepy/crap latch incidents at the start, I still don't fully trust Berwhale to ask for food when he needs it and tend not to let him go for longer than three hours in the day. But those are my issues and EA has always been a good feeder...

Berwhale likes the Avent dummies and the Nuk trendline ones.

Muse, is BobKate confusing hunger and tiredness? I kept feeding Berwhale with the same symptoms for the same reasons and then one night got annoyed and handed him to his father for a cuddle and he almost immediately went to sleep. Since then, not so much with the cluster feeds...

medee For feeding I think he was doing ~4-5 hours by end end of the first month. But it was always dictated by him. In the first 2 weeks I set the alarm so he'd never go longer than 4 hours, but of course EA is way past that. I am positive she'll let you knoe (with both barrels) should she awaken with the munchies! I don't know anything about bf specific dummies, but I do know that some the like and some they don't. Then once you've found one they REALLY get on well with you'll lose it in the street or the baby will "fling" it somewhere so it's not found for weeks. That much is true. We have at least half a dozen he never got on with (same for bottles) that maybe the next baybee will.

muser Your challenge of the day is to find a mobile which does not look as though it was designed and constructed by a sadistic serial killer.

Yes, it was me with the solo country house hotel break. I am thinking of booking another one...

meds We used Avent newborn dummies for Bonnie (Clyde refused completely). I have to admit that the main reason for choosing Avent is they come with a really useful snap cover for the teat so you can safely chuck them in your handbag as needed.

We never woke to feed, just fed on demand and got very good at the lying down night time feed. If he failed to wake and I was bursting a sneaky lying down dream feed seemed to do the trick.

And I totally agree about the WTETFY index! So illogical, and the most obvious things are entirely missing from the index.

Oh there's definitely a lot of that Drom. But our efforts to rock/cuddle instead don't seem to work.

I have just managed to calm a crying fit with a dummy though. No, spoke too soon. She spat it out. Must keep trying.

thanks all. That link was very useful, Drom. It also explains why she seems happier after a feed in bed, as I am much more reclined than on the sofa. I'll keep her at the 4 hours during the night until I can speak to the nurse or my HV. And I have propped up one end of the Moses basket.

Does anyone know about the "winding down" of milk? Bear is now offered 3 large bottles a day in addition to water. It's very much hit & miss as to whether he'll drink it or not. E.g., 9pm last night he drank barely 90ml, at 7am this morning he tanned the full 180. I assume it's a natural progression in their development, particularly as food becomes more fun - but does anyone know anything about it? He's 10 months now and I'm sure I read/heard somewhere that at a year it really changes with regards to want/need. He seems perfectly healthy of course.

fanjo did your night away improve things at home? HI is still clueless about a lot of stuff and I'm thinking chuck him in at the deep end and hope bambino is alright!!

morning ESHes.

Meds re: the reflux, BB has it but the infant gaviscon helps loads. We do lots and lots of back rubbing and keep her upright after a feed for around 30 mins*. Apparently you can buy special reflux wedge shaped cushions with puffy barriers on the side to stop them falling off. I've heard they are good if baby likes to be 'contained'. BB doesn't, she even hated swaddling so we just went with raising the basket on books. BB likes the MAM soothers but we bought 3 different ones to start with - she didn't like ones that were too small, or ones with rings on them. I think it is just a case of trying a few different ones and persevering. I kept offering a dummy every few days until she eventually took one. Now she is trying to suck her thumb and I'm more than happy for that to happen - it saves the worry of going out without dummy (did this yesterday, bad move).

• When I say I hold her upright I do cheat now - her swing chair has an almost upright position so I strap her in that if I need to go and do something. Or I stick her in the play gym which is basically an inflatable ring covered in bright fabric so she can be propped up.

Alps I'm afraid I can't remember about the milk thing. I know they are supposed to have a certain amount until they are one, but I can't for the life of me remember what that amount is. I am amazed at the stuff I have forgotten since having Boo - what has happened to my brain? I'm sure I used to have one. I am slightly concerned about starting a degree course in Sept - how on earth will I remember everything? Last night I popped out to collect a takeaway - sat in car, car in gear, handbrake off, foot on accelerator but not moving forward. Then it dawned on me that there should be noise - I hadn't actually turned the ignition key. BB is now 4 months old (how the fuck did that happen?) - can I still blame babybrain?

'Lo all!

Meds glad EA is better. I didn't have the issues you have already faced so this might not be relevant but I never woke Clint to feed after the first week or so - I felt he'd wake if he was.hungry and I was basically feeding on demand. But he was a strong little baby and though I am was largely clueless this.was an instinctive thing. It worked for us but may have been luck not judgement. Clint cluster fed loads of an evening but this ultimately helped him sleep longer too....and as long as the telly was on I didn't mind. I did lying down feeding sometimes, was great when nips were sore, but sometimes made Clint puke.

4 day weekends rule. Actually feel like a weekend due to lovely TSF. Sorry some oh's here are crap, my sister's husband is useless and it is frustrating and heartbreaking to see, I have no idea how people cope in that sit and I salute you strong women managing to. I have so little to cope with and am still often ground down. Need a holiday! Cannot bring self to abandon Clint. Argh. Motherhood - clichetastic!

Sorry, not sure where all that came from. As you were.

Is ok, Vajazzalle. Am about to abandon Berwhale with his daddy to go and have lunch with a mate. Feel dreadful. Although this may be because I have to drive through thatLondon with a passenger which also feels wildly stressful...

TBG has gone out with KateBob, she needed a nap and was refusing to sleep so he bundled her into the BabyBjorn and out the door before I went insane. I have done the washing up, ordered the groceries and think I may start on some tidying.

The Ergo arrived today, looking forward to trying it out.

The thing I like most about the Ergo at the moment is the insert, which means that if Berwhale falls asleep in it, he will sometimes be put down and not wake up...

Muse, have you tried gently pulling on the dummy when KateBob sucks on it? That seems to help Berwhale keep the dummy in a kind of fuck-you-mummy way.

silv I don't think my night away made that much difference to MrP's abilities. He is actually pretty good. The one thing the break achieved was he wrote himself a little list stuck to fridge for what to take when he goes out (milk, food, nappies, etc - but he still manages to forget the buggy!).

My tiredness is not because he's not capable, it's because he keeps disappearing on these work trips and leaving me to cope for days on end with no break.

Despite this, he still manages to always convince me that he is the most exhausted of the two of us.