July 2007 - yet starting in June!

[Jamantha]

Well, I can't see a post natal July 2007 thread, so will start this, even though Charlotte, my DD was born 4.5 weeks early in June. I'm sure the other July ladies will be along soon enough.

Have had 2 nights at home now. Yesterday afternoon was fairly distressing as Charlotte wouldn't latch on, and if she did she wouldn't suck. But have got loan of electric pump from hospital, and support from midwives and now managing with comination of breast, expressed and formula milk, sometimes all three in the same feed. Finding it quite emotional, with all the issues associated with feeding one's baby, but trying to stay calm as found out yesterday that getting self into a state doesn't help anyone.

Dh has just gone out to get some things we're still missing, and I'm putting my feet up for a bit. Phil & Ted has just arrived so we might try a stroll down to the ante natal class tonight!

Any how, hope there are lots of lovely birth stories to come from July ladies, and that we can swap advice, give each other moral support etc over the coming weeks and months.

hi jabuti and welcome,

With my DD i combined breast and bottle from a few weeks, as i felt my milk wasn't satisfying her in the evenings, and i was shattered. she had one bottle of formula every evening, and when it suited, but i did find that the more formula i gave, the less milk i produced - a vicious circle as you only produce the milk you need. i stopped bf at 8 months.

This time round I have been combining breast and bottle, but all EBM so far. I pump twice a day which makes enough for 2 bottles a day. I will carry this on as long as i can, but will top-up with formula if/when i need to.

HTH

Hi all,

Congrats Kyte and welcome Nicholas - we were all worried about you, so I'm delighted to hear you're both ok... albeit after a tough start. Great you're not feeling traumatised though

Teats have arrived here today, so going to try expressing and bottle-feeding some EBM. LO is still a star, however has had a few green poos the last few days (accompanied by red face and straining last seen in a hospital delivery room!) so have posted on the bf'ing section for some advice. Have read loads online but it's so hard to get nice definite answers How dare some things be variable!! If you've experienced this and have any wise words they'd be warmly received.

Jamantha - I had an insight into your impressive let down when I had a spray (by itself, no squeezing) for about 10 seconds last night - no wonder she was fussing!!!! Maybe we should start a competition for duration and distance of spray.

I'm heading to see the NCT ladies today - need to go and buy (medicinal) cakes first.

Hope everyone is doing ok.

Kyte congratulations. Your experience post birth sounds very similar to mine. I sympathise and am glad your lo is now doing much better. Sorry your hb didn't go quite as smoothly as you would have liked. Hope you feel better soon - don't try to do too much too soon.

Congratulations Jabuti and welcome to your lo. Take it easy too.

Precious yes I am thinking of learning baby signing. Not sure where I can learn round here, but a friend did it so will ask her. Well done on having your first night away - glad all went well.

Whomping - baby signing is learning signs with your baby that they can use to communicate with you that they want milk etc, before they can talk (I think). Don't stress too much about lo not settling - it is still early days. Swaddling seems to help Evelyn when she won't settle. Often though it seems to be wind that is making her uncomfortable. DH is better at shifting it than me so I then have to wake him up! Usually 5 mins later and she is happily drifting off to sleep even though I may have been trying to settle her for an hour! DH didn't even notice that she'd woken up last night or that I had fed her until I got back into bed after doing her nappy.

Miaou glad everything seems to be going ok. Good luck getting to the registrars.

Chooster my lo has oral thrush and my nips have been getting very painful (after feeding). She;s been treated but I haven't. Am going to check with mw again today when she visits. DD loves her cherry flavoured medicine! I don't think it will always be so easy to get medicine in her though!

Emmyb - glad you are feeling a bit better. After having a really good day on Sunday, I kept bursting into tears yesterday (including in front of the doc at the hospital). My DD is 3 wks old too so it is still early days with hormones all over.

Hey guys, can I come over now?

Baby Harley is now 6 days old and I love the little guy! Had a bad day Sunday where he just wouldn't settle, my milk had come in and I was hormonal!

Anyway another day today!

Can someone please please answer a few questions for a first timer?:

My boobies are huge! When I feed him they go slightly softer but feel very engorged. Milk only came in two days ago, so do I leave well alone or should I express some off?

I put him on one boobie and he chugs away for around 20 minutes. I wind him (well attempt to..not sure Im doing that right) and then try and put him other boobie...is this correct?

Feel a little better today and stitches are not so tight so hopefully may be able to get on here more now I can sit down!

Hugs to all.

hi all - ds2 now 13 days old so thought i would pop my head in here

just to respond to myfairone's questions about bfing - you should try to make sure he's emptied the first breast before moving him over. it's nigh on impossible to know for sure, but a good sign is whether he's continuing to suck - if he's pausing more than sucking, he may well have reached the end (never completely runs out of course, but the flow slows right down). also, your breats should feel very soft if emptied

the risk of swapping breasts too early is that he never reaches the fatty hind milk, which is very rich and needed to gain weight

if he's gaining weight well, it's likely you're doing things perfectly

cyee green poo is ok apparently (might be something to do with getting rid of bilirubin) - light poo and dark urine and things to watch for. i checked with hospital yesterday when dd had a jaundice check.

Kyte, I just read what happened to you...I am so glad that everything is fine with you now but so sorry to hear of your awful experience. I hope that Nicholas goes from strength to strength now

Thank you for the tip Tutter. Its so hard to judge when one is empty...I definitely know when one is full though!

kyte we're having problems tracking down a cheap cold water steriliser. mw suggested huge ice cream tub or tupperware container. just got to remember to buy ice cream when next make it to the shops.

can i ask a question please? Whats in the bounty pack you get in hospital? as dd was born at home i didn't get one and now wonder if i am missing out on any info.

hiya - our bundle of noise has arrived!

Oliver Kenneth was born at 2:58am on 6th July (no drugs - ouch that hurt!) and we are delighted that he has made our marriage a family. Unfortunately within 24 hours Oliver had contracted an infection and had to be taken into neo-natal and the high dependancy unit. Initially the doctors told us they thought it was meningitus and we had a frought few days sitting by his bed side wishing him better. He responded to the anti-biotics very quickly though and within 48 hours was moved to special care. He stayed there a couple more days before being transferred to a transitional care unit so that he could be with me but still be under the nurses care. It took us a week to get home and thankfully it wasn't meningitus, most likely a strep infection, but as you can imagine - a rough start for all of us. He was home for 2 and a half days before it became clear all was not well and we ended up in casualty (ER) in hospital - Oliver has some problems with his stomach - we were re-admitted on the sunday night and Oliver was observed. He is now on medicine for Reflux and i am on a dairy free diet as the Doctors think that the formula he was fed when he was in high dependency (he was fed through a tube in his nose whilst there to ensure he got food and fluids) mixed with the anti-biotics has left him intolerant to protein in milk. We finally came home again on wednesday night and are getting by. Some days are better than others as he also has colic (poor guy) but we are finally home and i hope we don't have to go back to hospital again. For someone who wanted a home birth spending 11 days in hospital was not ideal - but we are grateful to have been there as we would never have noticed how ill Oliver was until it was too late if we had been at home so thank heavens for small mercies.

He is beautiful and when he isn't crying is adorable! His 7 hour crying marathons though have pushed our nerves to the limits at times - mainly because it is so hard to see someone so precious be in so much pain for so long, but on the whole it is a wonderful experience to be a parent. Although with all his tummy problems i am finding it really tough and just wish there was someway of settling him but apparently time and patience is the key.

Melissa M - i saw quite a cheap cold water sterilising kit in Boots the other day - have you tried there?

congrats to Kyee and baby Nicolas, glad to hear he's feeling better.

baby signing website here: www.tinytalk.co.uk/index.htm - am too knackered to make it look pretty. Mum and I went to meet my sister for lunch, and we walked a bit far - am wiped out.

congrats Stigaloid, again glad to hear that your LO is feeling better

Yay - not wishing to tempt fate but think I may have just managed bedtime on my own!! DH normally has the better technique at settling her for bed (though I manage OK most times after night feeds. I wonder if at the end of the day I'm just a bit tired and fraught myself and she can sense my extreme NEED for her to settle?) but he's had to work a bit late tonight and we need things from the supermarket, so she had to do without Daddy's soothing moves. Took 15 mins of finger sucking, with my hand hanging over the edge of the basket, but so far, so good. Have got a bottle ready if she does wake and become distressed - I feel that as she fed from me at 11.15, 12.15, 2pm, a "snack" at 3.15, then decent feeds at 4.15 & 6.15 and a final suck for comfort at 7.15 that I've got nothing left to give for a few hours at least.

And congrats to stigaloid, kyee and any others I've missed. Sorry very rude of me to almost forget.

Hi everyone,

Jamantha I'm so impressed you've got your little one in bed by now. Ours is sitting up with DH. She must be a party girl, she's up til 11.00 every night...

And she seems to have developed a touch of colic. Didn't have it with DD1, but thankfully feel I've developd a little bit of immunity to the crying. With DD1 I couldn't let her cry for anything more than a few minutes - and she never did anyway. This little lady is certainly different. She seems to have real unsettled periods in the evening, but then crashes out for the night.

hi all, im back.

thanx for the congrats! we are so happy to have our little one with us, and outside of my belly!

jamantha and pulapula: from day one MWs at the hospital were telling me i might need to top up until i have a good constant flow of milk... the reality is, i cant function from 2-4 am, and my DH is doing bottles when neeeded, around 120 ml per night. im ever so grateful to have him to help me, i dont know how it would be without him. i cant express enough for now, although im doing it everyday im only getting around 40/50ml.

im trying to get around the problem of giving bottle and producing less milk by expressing. also we read its good to mix the expressed milk with formula because of the wonderful enzimes our milk has that helps the little one's digestion.

right now i feel like im constantly feeding. i hope once my flow is more constant i dont have to feed this much. i cant stop the bf though, i love this time we spend together, im just wishing for a more balanced schedule.

did i waffle? probably so. im so spacey these days.

Congratulations to Kyte and Stigaloid, I hope things settle down for you both now after a rough start.

So jealous of those who've got their LO's to bed, Bryher has been feeding since 7 and still wants more, I'm cuddling her now while she chews her fist, my one handed typing skills are improving. She keeps falling asleep, then wakes 10 minutes later. She's 11 days old so maybe this is her 2 week growth spurt, not that she needs it, she was 7lb 1oz at birth, 7lb 4oz at 3 days, and was weighed today and is 8lb 1oz. Greedy guts.
I'm hoping though that this long feed tonight will replace the 2 hour feed she's had at 2am for the past couple of nights.

Jamantha & Cyee, -I'd heard of "let down" but didn't understand what it was. When I'm feeding Bryher I have to have a cloth around to clean her face or stop the squirting. I'll have to start timing it now so I can join the competition.

I'm sorry but I have to brag. I tried my pre-pregnancy jeans on today.
They fit!
Not perfectly, but they fasten easily, I just like them a little looser normally.

It's my 30th birthday tomorrow, we'll be celebrating by finally taking the pram out. (The brakes were broken and we've only managed to get back to the shop today to swap it.) We were going to have a picnic at Heaton Park, but my trip out today exhausted me and I didn't even drive, so I think we're going to wander down to the corner shop, get some butties, then eat them in the garden instead. Then as my jeans fit I'm going to eat lots of birthday cake without feeling guilty

okay can someone please help me with what im doing wrong?

he keeps getting wet! i know i must be putting nappy on wrong but ive tried it all ways and still getting wet...

im tucking his little winky down and have used pampers & huggies...any tips?

huggies seem to have a bigger skirt bit on them that sticks out is that right?

Smaller nappies? Sorry can't really help you, am still struggling with muslins.

blblio - heaton park in newcastle? I used to live in newcastle, then whitley bay (sigh, i miss the seaside) before coming south.

bilblio, sorry mispely your name there

Can I ask - at the risk of sounding stupid and/or incompetant - what do people DO with their LO during the day? Am worried that I'm not doing enough with her, so thought I'd ask if anyone had any suggestions. She is 7 weeks by the way. We started a bit of "playing" (me showing her toys, making them dance, sing etc for her) a week or so ago, but am finding it so very hard because she doesn't seem to react much, if at all to it, and certainly can't manage to hold them herself. I talk to her as much as I can, either just telling her about what i'm/we're doing, or just nattering to her, but again it's hard. We do have a trip out most days, and I talk and/or smile/make funny faces to her for as long as she stays awake but that's often not for long. Then yesterday and today she's dozed on my lap most of the time - and can't get her to sleep much during the day not on my lap or shoulder ashe gets quite upset about 5 mins after being put in basket, which is another worry - so have done very little. Any ideas about what I should be doing with her?

Can I please join in?

I had my LO last Tuesday by C-section (persistent little devil - breech right the way through!) and have got the first week of a million visitors, insane hormones, furiously hungry baby trying to suck on bowling-ball shaped boobs and general chaos out of the way at last.

Motherhood's great though! And does anyone know whether Lansinoh would sell me shares ...?