March 2013- here we go....

[Oodsigma]

Welcome old & new to the other side!

I'll start with a stats list!

Ood -ds 7/3/13, dc4! Elcs

If anyone wants to add any more details feel free!

Leni the stitches will look totally different now. Everything's very swollen when its first stitched & as the swelling goes down, what previously looked like nice near stitches can look like they're gaping or opening up. Don't worry about that, the edges should only initially be roughly opposed for best healing rather than tightly wedged together.

If they're getting more painful rather than less & the bleeding's getting significantly heavier rather than lighter then those are the clues that you need checking out, if so give the midwives a ring & they should either come out to you or arrange fr you to pop back into the hospital for someone to have a peek.

Eig it sounds like you definitely needed it if you managed to sleep through that. I wish I could sleep through just a little more, I wake up at every slight change in breathing pattern, never mind all the little snores & whines!

Morning all. Not a brill night here - DD fed 5:30-11:30ish but she wanted that one last Fred and I let her fall asleep on me before putting her down at about 12:20.

Then she woke up at 3 and I fed her on/off till 5:15 - completely my fault as I was falling asleep myself as she was feeding so didn't do a good job of keeping her going in one good feed. I put her down and she woke again at 6, then she fell asleep on me and we both slept till 7:15 when I tried to put her down but she's feeding again.

So all my fault probably for being completely lazy and tired and not making the effort to keep her feeding well before letting her sleep.

It's just most frustrating when DH is happily sleeping away next to me!

Today I am going to try to do nothing but sleep when she does if I can...

SoYo, my mum gave me advice to put a small (pea-sized) ball of cotton wool in each ear just to cut out the lower level of noise and I've done that since DS was a few months old (but not since DD has been born!).

It just means you can still hear a lot but you won't hear every single snuffle or fart. I used to be the heaviest sleeper until I became a mum. One of those hazards I guess!

Oh and I have decided (in the middle of the night) that newborn baby post-feed tiny burps are the cutest noise

So night not good here! She fed at 10 pm 5 oz from the bottle but refused t go back to sleep. At 11.30 pm dh handed her over, she was wide awake and still starving, she feed again from me between 11.30 til 1am, then slept til 4.50. She fed again til 5.15 then I have woken her at 7.30 and fed her. She was so much more awake last night than she is in the day so today I am on a keep the baby awake and feeding well plan! So far keeping her awake hard!

Yes leni the stitches get better. I found taking arnica and ibuprofen helped with the swelling! wing you are so right on the noise. I have found that I am so tired by the night waking that I miss the litte noises!

She seems to be constantly feeding and then naps for a v short while then is hungry etc. I wanted to go back to bed this morning but zero chance so far...

Constant feeding is normal, isn't it?!

Yep. Sorry!

Is bitching for milk, drinking it for all of five seconds, then knocking the bottle away and throwing a flappy-armed tantrum until the bottle's returned normal too? Getting closer and closer to investing in some duct tape... How long does it take before they get their heads round the existence of their own arms?

Stormy can I borrow your tape when you're done with it? Also, is bitching for milk after guzzling 4oz normal? That's twice today, and he's only just shy of 9lbs! Greedy guts.

Is the duct tape for the bottle or to strap the arms down?!

DD's feed started after 6 tonight so so far I've watched the footy with DH and now catching up with Mastechef from earlier. Then I'm not sure how I'll kill the next hour or two after that

My milk is really full on now - in the evenings I've been sitting here with boobs out so they don't get stuck to anything but they are just dripping. Sorry TMI I know but I have noone else to share this with apart from DH

Anyway, I hope you all have good nights ahead of you (including me!) and see you on the other side...

Wing- the milk thing gets better, most women don't leak when their milk settles down or only if any baby cries.

I wonder if duct tape could also be used for keeping scratch mitts on?

Thanks Ood!

Well DD finally stopped feeding at 12:15ish but I snoozed with her on me until 12:55 when I finally put her down (to make sure she was really asleep). Then I think she woke at 2:25 and fed/snoozed (andbi snoozed too) until 3 perhaps and then slept till 5:45 when she became very noisy and grunty but didn't actually need feeding until 6:15 - and I've been feeding her on/off since then.

Even though that sounds like a lot of disturbance, I feel more rested than I did the night before. I think as they were only short it wasn't as bad as being awake for hours in the middle of the night.

Hope you all slept well?

plonk I discovered the sleep suits with built in mitts for dd3, total revelation!

Ds slept well last night. Put him in a sleeping bag and I am hopeful that helped.

Ood I've only bought ones with built in mitts but many of our lovely childless friends and relatives have lavished us with old skool tops and suits requiring additional mitts. I plan to get them back when they have their own kids, and I won't be kind enough to supply mitts and tape...

Sleeping bags are fantastic aren't they? DS has used his twice now, he looks so cosy in it. And better nights sleep too.

Wing I think you're a hero. At casa del plonky our nights consist of feeding at 8, midnight, 4am and 8 am, and I find that tiring!

Upon DP's insistence that i change the baby I made the mistake of taking off DS's nappy when he wasn't quite, erm, complete. He strained away and I found another use for muslins and used about half a pack of baby wipes to catch as much as I could. Nappy off poopocalypse! i contaibed most of it but DS still managed to wee all over the bed. And now he's sound asleep!

Four ounces, plonko? I dream of the day she'll take four ounces. I seem to have a baby with the world's smallest appetite. Was yours actually hungry, or just wanting to suck something?

No duct tape needed for the bottle once you've mastered the art of holding it steady with your chin, leaving your other hand free. Only thing you can't really do in that position is drink a cup of tea, alas. No, the tape is for two purposes: keeping the dummy in place (she's on the verge of sleep, it falls out of her mouth, she realises and wakes up and roots for it. Repeatedly. Sigh); and keeping the arms and legs in place. We have stretchy gro-swaddle blankets, and they're grand when you get them just right, but after a few days' use they're extra stretchy and she is awesomely good at getting her arms out. And then getting freaked out by her arms. Starting to think baby straitjackets might be easier.

So, yesterday we had a sleep resistant baby. She was doing two hours awake, forty five minutes asleep. By 6pm it was clearly all too much, and she went into demon banshee mode for the first (and hopefully last) time. Screamed for an hour and a half (with a five minute break while my brother cuddled her and read her Wobble Bear book three times in a row). I went to bed at half past nine, and couldn't sleep. Wtf, insomnia? Of all the times to kick in! Baby fed at 1.30 and deposited next to me, slept with minimal fussing, started fussing in her sleep at 4.45. Decided to try just working the bottle into her mouth with her still in the basket. Success! She nearly finished the bottle, and just kept on sleeping (with a bit of wind related wriggling and some truly epic bubbly farts). Then slept through until 8am.

I'm thinking about trying out a sleeping bag. We have several, so might as well. And yesterday when she finally fell asleep after the banshee attack, she got an arm right out of the swaddle and just threw it up next to her head and slept peacefully. So I'm hopeful the end of the "scared of her own arms" stage is in sight.

A few questions (looking at you here, Ood, as you're the pro here).
Newborn inserts in prams - about how old do they need to be before they don't need them?
Those bouncy chair things - how old before they can use those?
Should I be worried about the lack of appetite? If we don't wake her to feed, and just follow her lead, she takes two and a half ounces at a time usually, and manages around eighteen total per day. Formula box says twenty four a day by now, but she just doesn't seem to want any more.

Plonko - I'm no hero! I am terrible with no sleep but I'm keeping going at the moment and having DS helps me to just get on with it.

Stormy those amounts on the boxes are probably guidelines and will be averages. Don't worry too much if she's not getting that amount - as long as she's putting on weight fine and is pooing and weeing enough she is probably fine. I wonder if her sleep resistance yesterday was due to hunger? Sounds like you sorted the dream feed out though which will be a great help. :)

Re bouncers, if you mean the reclined chair things then we have used ours with both DCs from day one just for something to sleep in really. I can't remember when we took the head support thing out of our car seat if that's what you mean?

And we have a Wobble Bear book which we read to DS all the time. I think it's WB's busy day or something. I could probably recite it...

Off to my postnatal MW appt in a minute. DD's umbilical cord fell off two days ago which I think is earlier than you'd expect and is a bit weepy so I'll get her to look at that.

I thought it could be hunger. Offered a bottle, no joy. I think it was mainly overtiredness, although thinking back, she may have been a bit cold too. There's another question: what temperature is everyone keeping their rooms at, and how many blankets are you using? We're on swaddle, cellular blanket, and a thick crocheted blanket downstairs. Thermostat in the kitchen generally set to about 16 degrees in the day. No double glazing down here, and it's open plan, blinds rather than curtains. The midwife a couple of weeks back said if it's fine for me it'll be fine for her, but I'm (how shall I put this?) quite well insulated and don't really feel the cold. And then the bedroom (temperature supposedly controlled by the same thermostat) has double glazing, curtains, and a closed door, and the thermometer in there is showing 21 degrees. How do people heat their houses according to the baby guidelines?!

Bouncers as in those slightly reclined chairs that have a bar across the front to attach toys to. They make excellent cat beds.

We use the head support from the car seat in the pram/buggy/whatever it's called, because the original one disappeared long ago. But it's sort of wedge-shaped to fit the car seat, which means there's not a lot of room to get her legs under the bar in the p/b/w. It's probably flat enough that she doesn't need it now, I'm just having a bit of first-time-mother don't-know-what-I'm-doing will-this-somehow-break-the-baby nerves.

The umbilical yuck-zone does look a bit grim when the stump first falls off, I recall. We were advised to clean carefully with warm water and cotton wool, and don't get anything else on it. It's just about healed up now, but there was a sort of semi-circle of light brown gunk there for a while. Fell off by itself when the skin underneath was healed. Hope all goes well at the midwife!

Hope everyone got some sleep and to those that didn't I sympathize. I had a bit of an emotional melt down this morning as I'm soo tired and LO had been fussing again since 6. We managed to get the colic sorted finally by swapping formula to the comfort one and dr Brown's bottles but now he has horrendous acid reflux at random times. He'll be fine some feeds then others he'll scream and constantly bring up milk or acid. I'm now dreading night times. I keep trying to tell myself it's not going to last forever.

With regards to how much it says they should be drinking on the formula packet my hv said to ignore it as all babies are different. As long as he's putting on weight and making dirty nappies it's enough. She did say to make sure there's always some milk left in the bottle when he's finished so you know he's not still wanting more. If he finishes the bottle she said to up the oz I'm giving him.

I have to say I've ignored the "how many blankets" advice. We tried it when we first got home but with him being premature he was getting cold so we wrapped him up much more than the advice. Now he's 6 weeks and a good weight but he seems to often get too hot! So much so I'm sure he's getting a heat rash, so now we tend to wrap him less than the advice. I'm starting to think I should just come to terms with having an awkward, non-average baby.

There's always a little left in the bottle, so I shall try to stop worrying for now.

Didn't think I was going to have chance to type this post - was about to then she started crying. So I made milk, and by the time I got back she was fast asleep again. So am now sitting here with a bottle of milk tucked into my armpit to keep it warm, and assuming she'll probably wake up properly soon.

Thinking about it, we weren't actually given any advice about how many blankets. So all I know really is that baby's room should be about eighteen degrees, and if it's colder add more blankets, and remove if it's warmer. No idea at all how many are actually recommended.

Ah, there we go, she's crying again. And sticking her finger in her eye. Someone pass the tape again!

Sounds like you're going through a rough patch Zigwig, but at least you've found some solutions. Hope the nights get easier!

We're back in bed cos I'm shattered, but instead of getting some zzz's I'm now worrying about formula! George finishes almost every bottle I make for him (if he doesn't finish it he falls asleep on it), especially now we've switched from SMA to cow&gate. Wondering if its worth making extra and seeing if he's just extra hungry? He has cried after some feeds the last few days, and I stupidly never suspected it could be because he's still hungry!

I think we should trade, stormy. Are you getting lots of wet/dirty nappies?

One or two with poo every day, plonko. And the nappy's wet every time I change it (after every feed except during the night, because it'd just wake her up and she's not bothered unless there's poo). So I guess she is getting enough, if she's pooing regularly and weeing all the time lots.

We're on Cow&Gate too! And I am very annoyed at Tesco's at the moment, because I know they sell the stuff but I can't find it on their website, which means I can't get my dad to add some to his weekly shop, and instead have to hike up there for it myself.

If Zoë's still bitching after finishing a whole bottle (very rare event) I offer her dummy first. If she takes that happily, she's not still hungry. Been a couple of occasions where she didn't want it but kept shouting and doing the shark mouth thing, so I just made her another ounce up. Drank it then threw it up again. Conclusion: crying was actually caused by tummy issues. For George though, I'd go with making an ounce more than usual and seeing how he goes. He may not want extra every time though, so there could be some trial and error (and wasted milk, which I hate cos it's not cheap!) until you work out when he's likely to be hungrier.

It's been three and a half hours since the last feed and she is sleeping peacefully still. Does this mean I'm in for a hellish night with a member of the wide-awake club?

I think I have the hungriest 3 week old ever, she did 7 ounces of expressed milk at the 10 pm feed then demanded more food at 1 am, 4 am and 7am. My boobs have nothing left!got to be time to go for formula soon my poor little boobs ( I am normally an a cup and now a c or d can't keep up!)

I know it's supposedly nothing to do with size bu I'll disappear, already back in all my pre pregancy clothes! If only I had the energy to leave the house .. Wash etc...

He just drained 5oz. And he calmly burped then fell asleep immediately. That NEVER happens! Jeezy Chreezy he's gonna be a bruiser isn't he?