November 2014 - newborn thread!

[Greenstone]

Welcome to all the November 2014 babies! Let all the post partum rejoicing and angst begin...

Aw she sounds colicky. Who diagnosed the thrush? Poor thing. I bet you're shattered too.

I tried self settling (the grannies advised it) and it didn't work. I've since been advised by midwives, health visitor and a Breast feeding consultant that my baby (2
weeks old at that point) is just too young to self settle.

I've decided to try a dairy free diet to see if that helps my baby who just seems to be uncomfortable all the time, especially after a feed. She even cries in her sleep. Tilting the cot doesn't seem to make a difference so I'm not convinced it's reflux.

I spotted it and the doc confirmed it. I am exhausted. I already cut out fruit because I think that was giving her a tummy ache (mw told us to try that, we were worried about dairy too because dp is allergic), she's definitely less 'stiff' when crying and before she poos.

Now in the routine of, infacol, feed, thrush cream, dummy. I never wanted to give her a dummy but it soothes her sore throat and itchy mouth. She's slept for 2.5 hours this evening, that's the longest stretch in a couple of days and I managed a nap too.

Wish us luck!

Lady did the doc give you thrush treatment too as a precaution? Otherwise you and your dd might end up transferring it back to each other. I just mention it because I believe thrush in the milk ducts can be quite painful.

Dd was weighed today and weight is well up. Mentioned the refluxy symptoms to the HV who said it may be partly because she is feeding so much she's constantly overfilling her tummy and bringing up the excess is painful for her. So she advocated trying to space out the feeds a little before trying medication which makes sense to me. Easier said than done! I used a dummy tonight for the first time, dh had a face on him, he hates dummies but as I pointed out to him it ain't him who's with her all day when she's screaming to comfort suck...

yes greenstone same stuff on my nips and my sis said to hot wash everything my nips and milk touch!

My dp felt the same and has completely reversed by day 7 in favour of sleep/peace Hope it works for you!

Good luck for tonight everyone!

I hope its ok tonight here - the Colic is still very trying, as its messing around with his Latch terribly which leads to frustration/screaming for him & very sore nips for me. He keeps gulping in air. Very hard to get him to feed for more than 5/10 mins cos he chokes and then conks out. And crap feeds = crap sleeps.

Had a massive sobbing fit earlier which frightened the life out of DH. But I'm just so tired and frazzled! Felt a bit better afterwards though as I got lots of much needed cuddles. Does anyone else find that all the cuddles are being directed towards the baby now and they're forgetting to cuddle each other too? The baby is even sleeping between us so I can't even snuggle in under his arm in bed! We have resolved tonight to find time to cuddle on the sofa as often as we can even if its just for a minute before Baby starts screaming again.

annarose we have scheduled in cuddles now for the same reason. When the baby cries and it's not for food or nappy I think she must be feeling how I'm feeling, desperate for a cuddle!!

Have you tried the biological nurturing feeding position? Meant to be good for ladies with a fast flow to stop the baby from guzzling down the milk with a load of air.

I sometimes use it in the night when my breasts are engorged and I think it helps... Although if she's really sleepy it doesn't really work.

Hope everyone has had a good night so far.

Hi all, mind if I join you? I was on the antenatal thread for a while but lost track!
DS (James!) was born 18 days ago, first sprog straightforward labour, had a water birth which was fab. Couple of stitches which have healed well. Had a night in hospital on Weds after some v.heavy bleeding, turns out I have a mild infection at placenta site, so I'm on antibiotics, which seem to be doing the trick.
We're endeavouring to BF, though using nipple shields at every feed. He was born with a bad tongue tie, and after 48hrs on post-natal failing to get him latched on, a midwife gave us a shield to try, and he took to it really well! He had his TT snipped at 8 days, and we had a go at weaning off the shield, but we were both finding it really stressful, so gave up after a couple of days.
I can't see any harm in the shield and it doesn't seem to be affecting my supply, so I figure better we're BFing with it than not at all!
Had him weighed at 2wks and he was just 1oz off birth weight (7lb 11oz) so that's good... Hoping he's put on well for when we see her on Tues and then I can stop feeling worried about the shield!
He's very unpredictable feeding wise at the minute, sometimes he'll chow down then go 2-3hrs without, but he's started cluster feeding at random times just to keep me on my toes
Tonight he slept 11:30-4am, but he's been feeding non-stop since then!
Hope everyone is well, it's been a real help to read through the thread and see that we're all in the same boat!

Nessalina, your little one is a day younger than mine who is 19 days old today!

My baby is very random with her feeds. The longest stretch being 4-5 hours it seems. But she regularly feeds every 30 minutes in the day.

Another better night here. Although we've had to make sure that she didn't sleep for 5 hours again as she's still not started putting on weight. The loss is still well within the 10% though so MW was happy. I can't help wonder if the antibiotics and the fact she was 1 day old before feeding properly (licked a little bit of colostrum off her lips in the delivery suite, but was then nil by mouth for a day in NICU) have affected the gain.

Last night was helped by the fact I've figured out holding her on my shoulder and DH did me a flask of hot chocolate.

Horrid night for me! DD woke at 3:15 and has been awake since, feeding on and off. Every time she dropped off and I put her down, she woke up and screamed. Then she wanted to feed again until she slept, then I put her down, then she would wake up and shout and we just went round and round in circles. I am shattered! I bought a hand pump yesterday so going to give expressing a go for the first time this weekend. Non FTMs, my only concern is nipple confusion either way! I don't want DD to like the bottle so much she refuses the boob or to reject the bottle completely. She is 2.5 weeks at the moment and fairly established BFing. Too early still or no?!

twiglet I had to bottle feed my baby from day 3-7. She went back on the boob no problem after and still breast feeding now at day 19.

Mine is 2.5 weeks & DH is downstairs right now giving him a bottle of EBM to give me a lie in. Bliss!

He's had three or four bottles of EBM so far & doesn't seem affected either way. I have to express after every occasion though as boobs want to explode & need to keep up supply. I don't mind though. Its lovely having some emergency EBM in the fridge. I went to Boots the other day & left BAby at home with DH! I pottered about amongst the testers all on my own! It was FAB.

Ooh we definitely need to give expressing a go. I've got the pump, just haven't had the chance to get it out of the box yet!
We're off to the OOH GP - J has a bit of a cold I think! Poor sniffly thing, he's getting really angry with his nose!

Much better here, I got about 6 hours on my new routine.

I express but still do it by hand and I give it to dd by syringe but she is only 8 days.

Hope there are naps in store for those who need them later, we have oodles of visitors...

Welcome Nessalina hope you're all doing ok.

We had a night of "firsts" last night after a really poor night on Thursday where we got just two hrs sleep all night!

So we used a dummy last night to help soothe LO in the early evening which he seemed to take it but I'm worried he'll get confused with that my nipple and the nipple shields
I'm using for BF on my left side. So hoping to use for emergencies only eg when he's been wailing all day like yesterday for no reason.

Last night we also tried giving him a bottle (one of those small Cow & Gate ones that are already made up) to help see if it would fill him up for longer overnight. Hmm he managed from 12-2am before he woke up & projectile vomited everywhere inc our bedroom carpet and bedding. He seemed to do it in his sleep though so managed to get everything changed inc him and him back down quite smoothly considering. Then he slept through until feeds at 4 & 7 phew but now seems to have moved in last couple of days from 3-4hrs between feeds to 2 hrs frustratingly!

Feeling bit better as we've had a bit more sleep but will see what today brings - it's the constant crying that goes right through me after a while! Looks like he's coming to now so best go and try and he a quick shower - hope you all have good weekends x

Another one here looking to start expressing soon. Have got a medela manual pump with a calma bottle but realised today I need a steriliser (duh) so just ordered a cold water Milton one off amazon.
My nipples are finally starting to heal thanks to the suggestion of breast shells, never knew they existed but they're my new bffs! Now they don't get squished flat in my bra. There's also minimal cone boobage although my friend gave me a funny look earlier after we had a hug!

We actually went out for dinner last night, just zizzis, but it was so nice to get out. She was an angel and slept through, we even got dessert!!

My MIL is about to arrive for her first visit to her grandchild. She's a lovely woman and I want it to be very very special.

My cousin has invited herself (with her kid) to see the baby. I suggested Sunday cos of MIL's first visit. No, she can only do Saturday. I said well MIL is coming at 1.30 so its not a good time. Oh, she'll come later in the afternoon. I was horrified at the thought of MIL getting about half an hour of snuggles before Cousin & Kid descended so asked if it could be earlier instead. Made up a lie about MIL wanting to bring us out for our tea.

No problem said Cousin. And now its 13.22 and Yep, you've guessed it, she hasn't turned up yet. So now she & her 8 year old kid are gonna be sitting here when MIL arrives and I'm going to feel awkward as hell.

DH is furious. He'll barely be civil, I know it. Don't really blame him. I find it hard to be understanding when I told Cousin it was MILs special first visit.

After keeping me awake nearly all night my baby has now been asleep for about 3hrs without even being held. Sadly, no sleep for me, as DH did his usual thing of saying I'm just going to get dressed, going upstairs then coming down 2hrs later not dressed, so I was downstairs with both girls. He also got to lie in until 10. He didn't go to bed until about 3 because he was working apparently but he still got a lot more sleep than me. He has just gone to the supermarket with DD1 but DD2 will be waking up very soon.

Our close caboo carrier (as Discussed a couple of pages ago) arrived yesterday. We like it. She seemed comfortable and happy in it and it was reasonably easy for very uncoordinated me to do and comfortable carrying her.

How lovely moggle! We're going to treat ourselves to a Dominos tonite - I'm going to have to work my way up to eating out!

Ooh Anna I'd be ragey What happened?

Happy - how frustrating, nothing worse than realising that your baby is actually having a decent sleep and you could've been sleeping too!

J seems A lot better, he's only had one dose of the drops but they seem to be doing the trick! I'm enjoying some cosy baby cuddles on the couch

Hi folks, haven't posted in ages. Hope we are all coping /,surviving or thriving during these early days and nights.

we named our daughter caoilainn - to go with her big sis who is caoimhe.

we have had some ips and downs - i have an infection in my uterus which floored me but have managed to keep up with bf by expressing. Poor thing now has thrush which is making feeding hard and apparently i have an oversupply of milk which means she gets too much hindmilk and is hard to settle
hoping to see bf specialist next week to ser what we do about that!

all trials and wee hurdles to overcome!!!

Oh weeonion you've had a shit time!

Happy Imwould have gone nuts, massive hugs.

Cousin came 5 mins before MIL! Aarrrgh! But I straight away said to her that MIL wanted some alone time with baby when she arrived so we may have to cut it short. Felt a bit bad when I saw the mountain of gifts that Cousin had brought for the baby. So then MIL arrived and Cousin thankfully made herself scarce sharpish. But what could I do?! MIL trumps Cousin!

Actually a bit stressful having MIL here - lovely woman but baby is fussy and windy and crying a lot and needing a lot of feeding. So I'm having to discretely BF him in front of her as I can't bear going up to a cold bedroom. Thankfully have big woolly jumper on which hides most. But difficult soothing a screaming baby when someone who's had a ton of kids is watching you!

ah anna glad mil got her time though. I feel the same way about my mil, she was a midwifery assistant so very keen to input, I told dp she can't come until I'm confident about bf.

weonion we also have the thrush problem, I'm still bf but we need to use a dummy to settle her.

After a very restless day baby has now been asleep for 4 hours!! I took a little nap with her too.

Made the mistake of sleeping with her next to me without breast pads yesterday and leaked through bra, top and sheets! We were soaked!!

So I need some advice ladies tho I know most of you are bf.
G is 4 weeks now and the evenings are getting worse - defo trapped wind! Not colic I think cos we can settle her and its not hours on end screaming .
She just wont settle and its horrid to hear her cry and get angry :(( she pulls her legs up and yells .
Am thinking of getting some anti colic bottles and switching to comfort milk . Any thoughts ?

DS is very fretful in the evenings, but I've started just feeding him if we've run out of other ideas, and he always goes on the boob for a bit which stops the crying! After feeds he either nods off for a while (on me, and then occasionally I can get away with putting him down in the Moses basket) but more often than not he's alert and happy for a bit, then starts to get pissed off, then we change him, bounce him about for a bit, and if he's still crying, back on the boob he goes!
At first I was like 'I'm not feeding you, you can't possibly be hungry, but then I read up a bit about cluster feeding, and the fact that you can't actually over feed a BF baby, and I started to move to a 'when in doubt, feed him' philosophy! Seems to be working ok, though the downside is that I'm doing nowt but feeding in the evenings...

Same here Nessalina. Cluster feeding has gone a bit crazy the last couple of days. Last night dd decided she wanted to do nothing but feed between 2 and 5 am. Each feed is taking longer, which doesn't help. She had been increasing the time between night feeds so I'm really hoping this is just a growth spurt and will stop soon. She's spent most of this evening feeding too and seems to be limbering up for a long night feed. She sucks like crazy, making little groans as though she's been starved for days, so she really does seem hungry.

She's also developed a habit of forgetting to unlatch before pulling her head right back, which is not fun. HV said I could train her out of it but it's taking a while.