October 2012 babies part 2: winding, yawning and grizzling, and first smiles?

[YompingJo]

Part 2: in which our babies learn to sleep through the night and make us tea in the morning

Orange you are allowed to be paranoid about PFB. It's in the job description. I would go with someone who had one drink or have one myself.

Zara much kudos and sympathy on your epic journey and jet lag. Have you tried breast milk in the babies eye? Worked a treat on master midges gammy eye.

Midget I heard that about breastmilk! I still think I have a bit left in my boobs so will try squeeze some out when he's awake

I'll post you some if not

I wouldnt have even one drink and then drive, that's just my choice. I didn't go on about it, I wouldn't have even mentioned it but he kept pestering me for a reason. He was ok but then Dad chipped in as well. They have a very different attitude to alcohol than I do and they just made me feel stupid.

You are not stupid, you are protective and that is very different

Thanks. I do let things get to me sometimes, he's probably forgotten already.

Morning :) How is everyone doing today? Hoping for not too bad a night's sleep for all! Got about 4 hours, broken up, which I guess isn't so bad.

Squid Quincy is five weeks old today so I'm hoping what you say about feeding/sleeping better rings true for him too!

Leaking here also...have graduated to Tena pads from the big thick maternity pads but although it has been five weeks, vajayjay just doesn't feel right/normal. Not in a something's terribly wrong kind of way, just not comfortable and kinda constantly damp which just makes things more uncomfortable. God, sorry everyone - too much fricken' information!

One thing though - actually two - Quincy has a little chafing in the fat roll of his left leg, high up near his groin. I've been putting coconut oil on it since it's the elixir of the gods, but it's getting worse so have been putting some Sudocrem on it. The skin has come away a bit and my instincts are to try and air it out - but given that would require no nappy and holding his leg out since it's deep in a fat roll, I'm not sure what to do. I had him in the bath for as long as possible yesterday to give him some nappy free time but the poor love - it looks so sore!

Lots of support for all us breastfeeders - don't have much to add other than I can relate to everything that's been said and we can take solace in that it's all normal. It's relentless, kinda uncomfortable, Quincy actively fights with my breasts of an evening, and I've never felt so deeply unattractive in my life. Oh's well, it's a massive improvement on the sobbing/bleeding/deep dread of each feed so that's something

Just a quick note of encouragement to the bfing ladies - if you are planning an overseas trip with babba, do it while you're bfing!!! My sterilising system for my longhaul trip discussed in one of my other threads worked fantastically and was really easy in the end (thank you MN!!!) BUT it was still a fecking pain in the hole sterilising a bottle every few hours on the plane! And carrying so many Aptamil cartons made my hand luggage very heavy.

My Milton-and-Fairy-liquid-chafed hands say: if your boobs work, baby likes them and it doesn't hurt (too much), keep at it!!

Bottle feeding sisters: go and get yourselves a Milton Solo Travel Steriliser NOW. It's only a tenner and it's brilliant. You can sterilise using cold water method OR in a microwave. Really really easy to deal to bottles (and pacifiers etc) in plane toilets, airport loos etc.

Everyone: you need a Baby Bjorn or some kind of structured/easy to put on baby carrier for airports if travelling. Easy, no faff. Cloth ones too hard to take off when you have to go thru body scanner. Saw at Heathrow a woman wearing a Moby who had to unwrap all of it and put in tray for X-ray but me and other Baby Bjorn wearers got to walk through metal detector with baby still strapped in.

Zara DS2's eye was gooey until about 6wks. I occasionally remembered to try to get a bit of breastmilk in it but in the end he just woke up one morning and it was gone. No treatment or anything, dunno if it was just a blocked duct that cleared. Apparently rubbing that side of the nose downwards helps to clear it - I tried that too.

Orenishii don't know if you bought any disposible incontinence sheets for you after the birth, but they're good to put babies on for nappy free dry time. If not you can buy a pack in boots for about 3 quid.

squid thanks for getting back to me about my worries, and it's great to hear about your Dad with his pectus excavatum, it is reassuring! When she started poking around his dimple I had a faint moment where I thought maybe he had two anuses now that would be a hell of a thing.

Beccus was also imagining a faintly orange baby with a french manicure

We're having feeding ishoos here. Last 3 days DS2 has barely fed at all. I seem to vaguely remember a similar issue with DS1 at around this age, but can't for the life of me remember how it all panned out. Well, DS1 is obviously alive and well, so it worked out in the end... But it's a bit ofa nightmare.

Basically he'll latch half-heartedly, suck a bit, and when the let-down starts he'll choke, pull off and refuse to go back on. Really worried that my forceful let-down is going to result in my baby starving... DS1 never dropped any weight at any time, so no cause for concern, but DS2 has dropped from 75th to 50th centile. And he almost always refuses the right boob, which is potentially going to mean I end up looking a bit like a Picasso. Worried the supply on that side will just dry up - I have no time to express. Argh!!

Morning all. Just popping on to jot this down, will have to come back for a properread a bit later.

My dear mil got me a pump for christmas and i got it early! She have it to me yesterday and i was eager to try it out today. Is a Medela pump in style advanced double pump.

Well ds slept 5 hours straight from 1 to 6am and i woke up with right breast quite engorged. So i feed him first, and pumped just that one breast and got 3oz=90ml. I am excited! Dh is off work the next 6 Weeks and i am hoping to get a few nights coming up where he can get up and do the night feeds and settle and change ds so that he can get a taste of what i have been dealing with i can sleep.

For those pumping, what is a reasonable amount to expect if ds has not already fed on the breast?

WantAnOrange I agree that if I'm driving I don't drink at all, but that's cos I feel tipsy on half a glass of wine - and that was even before pregnancy/bf abstinence. I don't think you were unreasonable at all as it's your choice entirely if you accept lifts from others who have had a drink so please don't feel you did anything wrong.

Thanks Londonmrs for expressing thoughts - I don't think I'll express much so that seems quite expensive for me but having read reviews about expressing machines then I can see how that kind is worth it if you do a lot. I'll maybe just try hand expressing as if I time it right my boob will spray milk everywhere of it's own accord so challenge is getting it in a container!!

Zara impressed at your adventures -you are braver than me to undertake such a journey with your LO, well done

beeble 90ml from one side is loads well done. I only go 50 from both last week!

Crazy... Hope everything is alright at your next check. I had to google what those two things were. From what i see, squid seems to have summed it up perfectly. If the dr wasnt too worried, then i hope you can do the same.

Have you tried expressing a bit before putting baby to breast? For a while i had to put warm cloth on and express a bit first before latching or milk would come out ds nose. Now we seem to be getting the hang of it but he needs lots of breaks to "come up for air" he also gulps a lot leading to gassy baby and lots of winding. I wind him 2 or 3 times a feed i think, or try to every few minutes. If he has a burp he will wriggle around and refuse to take the breast again until we work it out.

beeble that's a really good amount! once when mine were horribly engorged and I had a blocked duct I got nearly 300ml out of one boob. that was a shock! I have a bit of an oversupply problem though...
combining pumping and direct breast feeding is tough because it's hard to get supply right. I'm wary of giving expressed in bottle without pumping because my body gets the wrong message. equally I don't want to feed then pump loads or oversupply gets worse. the routine which seems to suit goes like this: feed from left boob. pump for similar time on right to prevent engorgement. next feed,same again but make sure right is emptied. next feed swap. it still means I'm producing too much and spending half my day attached to a breast pump, but it helps avoid discomfort. plus as baby grows, her demand will probably catch up to over supply. only annoying thing is having to express at night which makes the routine more stressful as it's so time consuming but no choice really. because we had such a difficult start to breast feeding, it's still slow and i'd never sleep if couldn't bottle feed at night.
5 weeks old and I'm still breast feeding. honestly didn't think I'd make it this far.
ugh sorry again about my horrible grammer and punctuation. still hating my new smart phone.

speaking of, as I'm a smart phone virgin, does anyone have any apps they would recommend for baby stuff or just night feed entertainment?
can't believe I've become someone who uses the word 'apps'.

crazy sorry I didn't comment on your worries about baby crazy. I have now googled it as I had never heard of either things so waited until i at least had some idea. Squid offers should advice, did the GP refer you to a paediatrician? Hope you feel better about it all today

Hi everyone. Crazy sorry to hear about the feeding problems. Is it the dreaded tongue tie maybe? Might be worth checking.

Just wondered if anyone else has a co sleeping cot? Just got one and going to try it tonight...

Suffering a crisis of confidence myself. DD2 cries a lot in the evening and I didn't have this with DD1 and end up in tears feeling knackered and useless. Then she sleeps well from midnight to 1am onwards waking just once till 7, so it's not all bad. I just feel that I should be able to settle her earlier on by now and I'm doing something wrong. She's just over 6 weeks.

london the mumsnet talk app obviously! Other than that the BBC news app is good and babycentre do one called "my baby". I generally end up reading random stuff on the net or on facebook thou.

beeble 3oz is excellent I think, I'm lucky if I can get a few drops after a feed and only about an oz if I feed one side and pump the other. Going out for works Christmas meal tonight and leaving DH with 12oz but that's taken me weeks and weeks to get so think it might just be easier to become social hermit from now on

crazy if he's refusing right boob have you tried holding in football hold so he's lying on the same side as when feeding on left, this worked for someone I know. Sympathies on other probs, we had to go for ultrasound on DD's hips and all fine but a worry at the time, just much better to get things investigated now, hope it works out.

After getting 4 nights on the trot of 5 straight hours sleep last night DD stubbornly refused to sleep until 3am last night and then up and wide awake at 6. Hooray for w/e's - as DH took her for extended walk at 8am so I could sleep some more. Needless to say by the time he got back I'd convinced myself she was seriously ill (unsettled baby + small red patch on chest + insanely paranoid mother = meningitis!) and had to take her temperature about 6 times (with forehead, ear and underarm thermometer) before I was satisfied that a trip to a+e was a slight over-reaction. This is motherhood though right? A lifetime of worrying about her...

Sorry xposted lizzie, that sounds a bit like us, DD very awake in evenings, at 6 weeks this was until 12 - 1 like you, just wanting to be held/bounced/fed all the time. Now 8 weeks and showing signs of bring sleepier in the evenings, usually settles 10-11ish (apart from last night!) then sleeps 5 hours, up for an hour then back down for about 3 so hang in there - will improve!

Lizzie. Same here. Long awake off and onfrom 8pm till 1am. Was getting 3.5 hours the between feeds from about week 2-4 now week 5 going into week 6 still going to bed around 1 but the first patch of sleep seems to have increased to 4.5-5 hours, followed by 2 hours awake time followed by 2 2hr naps so we stay in bed until 10 am or 11.

Dmil is full of theories. She says when babies hit the magical 13lb mark they start to turn around their nights and days and sleep much longer stretches at night.

Thanks woolley- that's reassuring! I'll hang in there. At least I know she can sleep. If she goes down at 12 she'll wake around half 3 then 7. When I think about that in the cold light if day it isn't bad at all, but when I'm knackered and desperate for sleep at bloody 10pm it's horrid!

Hello all,
Well, we are home from hospital with a healthy baby and, as an added bonus, dd1 has stopped vomiting and just looks very tired.
It's felt like a really hard week, I'm absolutely shattered and feel like I just want to sit and cry. I just need a break. Unfortunately both kids still need parenting!

Smiley - big waves and for you all! :) Well done on getting through you poor thing, hopefully you'll have an easier week.

Horrendous night last night - basically bean needed a poo and couldn't get it out. Cue windy, screamy, colicky baby desperate to feed but thrashing about in agony :( - was such a shock after over a month without the full on horrendous nightmare. Big love to all of you still at the 4-5 week stage and enduring this - I had honestly forgotten how shit it is - it's like pain, it sucks when it's there but you forget so quickly afterwards She screamed maniacally till 03:30 when I swaddled her, then she slept for a good while but only took small feeds and slept all day. She finally did a spectacular poonami this afternoon and needed bathed to clean up. Has dozed ever since but we've just woken her so she might actually burn some energy and get some sleep tonight

Runs in, hugs smiley and babysits for the DC's whilst she has

so glad you're home with two healthy children smiley.

I just had my first post birth orgasm during nap time with hubby. must admit I'm relieved to find that I've still got a clitoris...

smiley hooray for everyone being healthy! So much sympathy for how you're feeling Is there anyone who can help you? I really hope you can get some rest