November 2014 - The one where we figure it all out... Or at least try.

[Arkkorox]

Couldn't see another thread ladies! Crap title I know but I couldn't think of anything else!

Thisis how on earth did you manage to put the nappy in the wash!

Changing nappy is also hilarious too for DD, no idea why!

She's not at it 24/7 anna she just has moments when she shouts and squeals and screeches and then that's it for a couple of hours, it really takes it out of her sometimes.

First baby group tomorrow, going for a half hour taster session of baby sensory. I'm so nervous!

Babydolly also only has the odd outburst. She's smiley at home and for me and dp but other than that can be quite serious! Even a stranger in tesco said she had a very grown up face yesterday!

ark I bet tomorrow eve you'll wonder why you were nervous! I'm missing my baby group tomorrow (which also has a baby sensory taster conincidentally) as the oven fixing people are coming. I've had no proper oven for well over a month now!

My DD chats a bit now and again, and sometimes likes to shout but mostly she blows bubbles.

We went to baby signing yesterday which she liked, there were just 4 mums and babies. Today we went to baby yoga with about 10 mums and babies and I think the noise was too much for her, every time another baby started crying that set her off and she's been really clingy all afternoon. It wasn't exactly relaxing!

Is anyone else finding that their lo's are staring at you when you're eating? I don't know if she's interested in the food or just what we're doing but she's following food with an intense stare (like the dog does!!)

Marking place

Ah found you all!

anna so sorry things are so tough right now. I think you did the right thing going to the doctors now, ad's should help you cope with what's to come. I think you & your sister are so brave & inspirational moving in to care for him & I really hope it gives you the close family time you need. Make sure you do find out what support is available for palliative care at home though eg macmillan nurses etc. Sometimes you may need a break & they are there to help you all through it.

caz yes dd watches every time I eat! She is definitely curious. And usually smiles as I make silly 'mmmm' noises at her. We're going to start sitting her in the highchair at mealtimes when she's 4 months so she can watch, ready for when its time to join in!

DD has become a complete nap avoider. I cannot for the life of me settle her to sleep for a nap of longer than 30mins in the day (more often 15-20mins). Even in the car or pram she is now short napping. If we're out at someones house she is all smiles but as soon as we're home its meltdown central, so I'm thinking she must be overtired.
Its been impossible to work on it this week with ds off school. Turns out he's had a mild form of scarlet fever & has really been quite unwell with it. He's much better now though just hoping dd doesn't get it

Thanks omama

Anyone else getting the "why not put a bit of baby rice in the bottle?" comments? They've been coming at me thick and fast - today by someone in their twenties, ffs. People ask me if he's sleeping through, and no sooner do I get "No, but..." out of my mouth but someone suggests it.

Then you have to sit through the whole "people are too careful nowadays" speech.

No I'm not going to choke my child at barely four months old, thank you!

I often got the 'in my day we fed X at 3 months, never did X any harm' type of thing when I had ds, and he was sleeping through, so who knows what they'll say about dd! She's still nowhere near sleeping through!!

I get those comments and DD is doing a good 6 hour stint! My gran even bought me some! Having to tell fibs to get round that one - don't you know I have a 12 week old that sleeps 12 hours a night

DD Is stroking everything at the moment, particularly the bottle / boob when she's eating or my shoulder when I'm trying to get her to nod off. It's just so cute but she has to concentrate so hard to get her hand on what she wants to touch. Last night it was the logo on dps tshirt, she was so funny when he helped her put her hand on it, she just looked at him like ' thanks dad but I can do this myself?!' Hah!

I'm not too surprised by the similarities with October thread babies, but that is because DD is an October baby. She was due in November so I stayed with my antenatal thread postnatally. She does talk quite a lot and sometimes very loudly. Sometimes I can't work out if she is shouting because there is something wrong or just making a very loud noise just because she can. She is also fascinated by watching us eat. She has got a lot better at holding things so I let her hold a piece of my broccoli the other day but obviously took it away before she tried to put it in her mouth. Third set off jabs today, poor baby.

It was me talking about poo floople. I spoke to the HV yesterday and she seemed to think he might have a tummy upset. He's been quite grumpy as well so it could be that, but he's been pooing even more than your lo; every nappy has had poo in it

My MIL keeps telling me that her eldest was such a hungry baby that he was being fed arrowroot and various other foody things from 3 weeks!! This was 40 years ago, but it does mean that there's no way I'm leaving DS with her until he's weaned just in case she decides to do the same to him if he won't settle. I get it every time he cries when we're round there

We went to a weaning session at the local sure start on Monday and it was great. Loads of info and ideas and very very clear guidance on when to start weaning. That has got my MIL to back off a bit as I can say "the health visitor told us..." Official authority wins in this situation. DS is 95th percentile, has been since 6 weeks, and I get loads of "he won't go to 6 months just on mother's milk". Makes me all the more stubborn to do it!

I just got a couple of books out from the library on weaning since I'm totally clueless. I want to keep bf until she's a year though. Got to work out how much I can keep up once I'm back at work.

So I've been generally moaning/worrying about babydolly's 45 minute naps and decided to try going in at 25/30 mins and cuddling her to try and start a new sleep cycle and everytime I've tried she'll already been awake. I think shes only in fact having 20 minute naps and then laying there until she gets bored! I've just invested in 5 sheets of thick black paper and blacked out the windows in the hope it helps. Especially since morning wake up time seems to be getting earlier and earlier recently...

So odd that the day you talk about people harassing about giving solids my own mum just have sent me an email suggesting that maybe I should start to give her something once a day. (I emailed her this morning that DD is going through growth spurt and last night has been waking up every 2 hours). Our families still haven't visited, so I haven't had a chance yet to get attacked by all the opinionated baby experts. I am fuming... And have started to feel worried as my mum is soon visiting us and I might get constant unsolicited advice every time DD opens mouth for a shout or something. There are few more visits scheduled up to show off DD, so I guess I should brace myself.

With regards poops, she always has had few soiled nappies in the first part of the day, in that sense nothing has changed. But for last few weeks the poo has started to get much smellier (TMI!) and sometimes goes bit greenish. Up to then it has always been perfect yellow and little smelly. Who said that BF baby's poo does not smell?!

Don't know about sussing it out... I feel more adrift now than I did in the first couple of weeks. Been having some feeding problems here (latch problems, tongue tie, now nursing strike and she drew blood this morning) and I'm actively looking forward to being able to get real food into her. Not going to do baby rice or anything like that though.

The nursing strike is very weird - she fights and struggles and refuses the boob, then settles like a lamb for expressed milk or formula when the expressed milk runs out... but then two feeds later she's perfectly happy on the breast again. I think she's in training to be the next leader of the tube drivers' union, frequent short strikes!

God I think if I was BFing right now I'd be crackers. Well, even more than already!

First night in my parents house and both of us were unsettled at the change in environment. He woke demanding feeds at 10.30, 12.30, 2.30, 5.30 and then thankfully went back to sleep till an unprecedented 7am. I barely slept at all in between, waiting for him to stir and fretting about Dad. Very frustrating.

And Dad had a bad night, we had left an alarm with him but turns out it was just out of range and didn't work and he was pressing it for hours cos he needed to go to the toilet. My sis went down at 6am cos she was wondering why he hadn't called us and he was wet and very distressed. So now she's very distressed.

So a rocky start all around. We're getting a long-range alarm from Argos and DH is going to stay here tonight which will help me at least.

Formula feeders, how much is your baby drinking overnight? DS drained about 15 oz last night and I worry its too much. He doesn't always finish his bottles during the day and I think thats the reason. I'm trying to stop halfway through a bottle each time but he protests!

ladydolly I can recommend a Groblind blackout blind - sticks on with suction cups & adjustable to diff size windows - we use whenever we travel & its fab. At home we have blackout blinds/curtains in both kids rooms in fact ds was such an early waker I taped his blind to the window to stop even the tiniest chink of light getting in. The things we do in desperation eh?!

Speaking of 20 min naps dd often does these. Sometimes I can resettle her but not always. Try going in at 35 mins rather than 20 that way you'll know if she's gone back to sleep herself or not & if she has you should be able get in there without waking her. Did this many a time with ds

Anna sorry to hear how your first night went but hopefully tonight will be better.

Re feeding, dd varies - some nights she has 2 feeds totalling approx 10oz & others, has one feed of approx 6oz. She has 4 feeds in the daytime of around 4-5oz, but I'm definitely finding she isnt very hungry in the morning if she's fed post 3am. Last night she fed at 6pm (6oz), 3.15am (7oz) and only had 1oz of her bottle at 7.30am this morning. She's just not hungry for it & will often take til 10/11am until she's ready to eat!!

omama thanks for the tip! I wanted to see if it made a difference before I spent any real money. I have blackout blinds in there but they're not big enough or fitted properly. Not a mistake I'll make in the new house!
Not sure if it's worked on naps but she slept until gone 7 this morning thankfully.

She still feeds at least 3 times in the night, normally around midnight, 3 and 5 and again when she wakes up. Not sure what I can do about that really.

How long is everyone planning to bf? I was aiming for 6 months but I'd like to keep some feeds up for a year but go back to work when shes 9 months so trying to figure out how'll manage it. Dp looked shocked when I suggested it yesterday!!

I'm planning to bf as long as DD wants it. By the time I go back to work she'll be 11m and I'm hoping will be eating enough solids that she will only need a bf in the morning and evening. May well be the case at 9m too and you can always express a bottle for childcare.

Anna that's a rocky start but I'm sure things will run more smoothly once you've got these practicalities ironed out and then you can concentrate on dad and each other. My mum and her sisters and brother had a similar situation when my granddad was dying. I don't know if it's always possible, but he did manage to have a 'good death'. I hope your dad has the same.
Is it just you and your sister doing all the work, are there any nurses or any body coming to help out?

Palliative nurses are coming next week I think, but he's in no pain at all so his needs at the mo are purely personal care.

Its getting hard with toileting though. He insists on using a urinal, but has to srand up to do it, but can barely stand and his balance is shot. So its two of us supporting him each side + walking frame whilst he does it. Bit grim. The GP is coming today to have a big chat with him and I'm going to get him to address wearing pads etc. at least at night.

Its at a terrible in between stage where he insists on doing tnings normally but just isn't able. But then we daren't distress him.

My sis is going to have to take the baby this morning whilst I try to persuade him to wash. He thinks he doesn't need one - his mind is getting a bit irrational, I'm afraid.

And all this since Feb 9th! In-fucking-sane.

Fuck, anna this is brutal. Grab any support you can get for him and you with both hands. Thankfully palliative care has come a long way in the last 10 years but its still such a terrible thing for both patient and family.

anna keeping things "normal" for your dad probably means mentally not giving up, can understand him, but you should take any help available to have things easier. Anything what makes this time with your dad nicer. You are very strong person, any parent would be proud to have such a daughter!

I am in a slight state of shock. DD was on her tummy time roll (toy from M&P), I had my face close to hers talking to her to cheer her up to stay longer on the tummy with head up. She was all smiles and talking me back, but then pushed with her forehead in my face couple of times and I was like "what on earth is she doing there?!". Got myself up to see that she was trying to get her knees under the tummy and push herself and the roll forwards, some sort of crawling attempt. After 5-6 crawls she was completely wiped out and now is flat out (lets see if this one lasts more than 40 mins!). Are they supposed to do such a thing in 13 weeks or I've just been trying to cripple my baby by doing tummy time wrong way?

That's awesome strawberry!! babydolly does a very good catapillar impression now during tummy time!!

But she still cant nap. In fact today she's fallen asleep on the boob and then I've snuck out as usual but she's then woken up and howled. She was having none of it at baby massage either, screamed the place down as soon as I touched her. She just wantes to be held, she let me do her legs while on my lap for a bit. Very unusual, she hardly ever cries theae days (for something other than sleep refusal that is).

Hey all.
Health visitor came a few days ago and she mentioned DS not turning to the left. He has always had a preferred side and can look left hut very rarely does. After observing him she recommended a referral to physio. No probs. She has now rung today to say that the wait for physio was 6-8 weeks and she wants me to get a GP appointment as she feels he needs assessment before then. now shitting myself that he is poorly.

Anna keep on keeping on. You are all doing so well. You should be proud of yourself and your family.