The March-ers 2019 - Baby Talk #3

[Angelmiracle]

Thread 3 mamas

@cardboard33 First of all, hope your treatment continues as it is now.
We aren't doing anything for the first birthday. Might have A's godparents over, but even that is unlikely as they will have a couple of weeks old baby by then. As you say, he won't remember it and honestly, I've never been one for pointless nonsense.

Thanks everyone for the advice. Touch wood he's going to sleep quicker at night this week. He's still falling asleep with a bottle. Today we had an hours nap! We were laying in my bed so still not brilliant but it's progress. I still couldn't leave him as I didn't want him to roll of the bed. Going to try to continue doing this this week and then move into his room for the day naps.

@Cardboard33 I'm glad it's not been too much of a rough ride thus far - hopefully will continue like that. I can understand feeling strange about the other mums returning to work. But you are so far from being a failure it is ridiculous! You're a superwoman!

Wow, hiring halls for a first birthday? I guess maybe if you want to make it an excuse for a good old bash?! We had quite a number of people for DS1's first birthday, but it was in our back garden and very informal. DS1 spent much of it naked, in fact. I think the party for J will be A LOT smaller, mostly because it's March and not July, so unlikely to be able to hang out in the garden... Probs just sandwiches and cake in the afternoon for grandparents & a few close friends. I have cancelled a training day for it so I suppose I'd better do something!!!!

@AssumeItWasSomethingClever I've been thinking of you - how's it been going? An hour's nap is great - hope that has continued. We only had 30 mins today... I'm hoping that means we will have a more settled night than we have been this week.

How's the walking progress going with everyone? DS1 walked at 9 months and it nearly killed me with the stress of him getting into mischief, so it's been kind of lovely to have a baby that just crawls thus far. Put him behind a walker today though and he literally ran across the room pushing it! So I wonder how long it will take him to get his balance and get going now... He's starting to let go of things and do two second wobbly stands before grabbing back hold again. He looks so proud of himself when he does it - it's hilarious!

How's everyone doing?

@badbadbeans we've not made it to walking yet. He crawls like he could beat Roadrunner in a race and he's speedy as anything with his walker but not yet gone independently yet. He moves into the next room up at nursery this week and most of the children there are walking so I think that will push him forward a bit.

Has anyone's little one turned one yet? I can't remember what the first date was but I'm sure some arrived towards the end of February!

@BadBadBeans first, I'm glad you are getting closer to setting a date for your surgery and that you're feeling ready for it. Will it be a long stay in hospital for you?

How much does J take in the night? Will he drink the whole bottle or is it a case of taking a couple of ounces out of that one? We're on around 3x5oz bottles now but the middle one is hit and miss. I've been trying him on cows milk in his sippy cup, just a tiny amount as suggested by the HV to get him used to it. He has it in his porridge but he hates it as a drink. Tried it warm and cold so I'm a bit worried. It does say on the NHS site that he doesnt need cows milk as long as he has two portions of dairy but not sure how to go about dropping his formula.

G walks about 4 or 5 steps unaided, very wobbly and has only been doing it about a week I'd say. He seems to have made himself a route around our living room which means he only has to get off his feet if he wants to sit and play with something. Otherwise he has figured out he can reach from the sofa to coffee table, then if he takes a step he can then reach the storage footstool, then to his toy box, to the tv unit. Etc etc. So he spends most of the day cruising. I think he shocked himself when he walked from the table to me and I don't think I've ever seen him look so amazed and happy. Was super cute. He isn't steady at all though and the last step is always a dive towards me.

@AssumeItWasSomethingClever how are you doing now? I've just read your posts and your update sounds positive, great that you got an hours nap and definitely something to celebrate. How have you gotten on with trying to move him into his room? It sounds really difficult with everything going on xx

@Cardboard33 I'm so glad that your treatment is going well and you're not getting the bad side effects, really hope that continues for you. You're not a failure at all for not going back to work. If I could afford to then I wouldn't be going back and wouldnt feel like a failure.xx

With regards to birthdays, we aren't doing anything big. We're going to the zoo on the Saturday before with DPs oldest son and my mum. Then on his actual birthday DP has booked some time off. We will probably just take him swimming together or for a day out and then have a little indoor picnic!

I'm really really dreading going back to work now. How are those of you that are back doing? I was full time but now only doing Tues, Weds, Thurs. G will be in nursery on those days and has settling in sessions starting 10th March, 4 days but only two hour sessions with the last one being a half day session. I go back on the 24th.

I keep bursting into tears. I hated my job anyway. I work 25 miles from home which is ok in normal traffic but in rush hour is 90mins each way so he will be in nursery from 7:30am til around 6PM and I feel terrible. I don't want him in nursery near to work as the idiots seem to come out in force in rush hour cutting me up etc and I don't want him on the motorway for 3hrs a day. I just feel so down. Upset because the job is always full of pressure and tight deadlines dropping on you and more upset to give up my time with George for what amounts to a few hundred quid extra a month at this point.

Oh and as I've already written an essay I may as well continue. I've gotten into a really bad habit over the last few months of just napping with George on me. I started it because I spent the whole.time he was asleep in his cot just washing my hands due to my anxiety and so I thought if he napped on me I could at least have a break from that.

The problem is now that he hasnt napped in his cot for about 4 months! He sleeps through the night so thankfully it hasn't affected his ability to sleep up there and he actually prefers being put down awake to settle himself up there which is odd. But in the day he has about a 2hr nap mid morning on me and between an hour and 90mins about 3PM. I could really make the most of that time but I worry if I put him in his cot he will just wake up after 20mins. Do I just bite the bullet. I'm worried about his naps at nursery if I'm not there..

Phew. That was a long one!

@melissa112

In regards to napping. Don't worry about it. E never naps at home in his cot. He's in nursery 3 days and they've found their own way with him there. We rarely spend full days at home so otherwise he naps in the car or his pram. Nursery will find a way to get him to sleep there. I know at mine they have a couple that nap on nurses

@WhatALearningCurve that's good to know, thanks! How do you find being back at work?

@melissa112 if I'm honest I love it. However - I changed jobs completely and am now working 15 mins away either 2 or 3 days a week depending on what's on. Pre-Mat leave I worked in Manchester City Centre and I live north of Bury so it easily took me 2 hours to drive into work each day and the company were quite blatant about the fact they didn't care about staff satisfaction and were happy with high staff turnovers rather than looking at ways at retaining staff good at their jobs.

Financial wise I do not make enough ha. I'm having to look at getting a second job for at night once E is asleep working from home. But I'm playing the long game and what I'm doing now has a lot more financial opportunity once I have the experience so by the time he's in school I should be "okay" for the future

In terms of doing 3 days a week - it also means I'm a much better mum on the days I spend with him because I'm fully involved. I mean this with no disrespect to anyone and I love my child more then life itself. But I think I'd go insane entertaining a toddler every day of the week! Especially with the weather being like it is ha.

I feel more like a failure in terms of my career development than anything else. I was going somewhere, so to speak, before my diagnosis and had made connections with all of the right people for future roles to open up. Then my diagnosis four years ago changed everything as I couldn't make the career decisions I wanted to make as I needed to focus on "boring" things like sick pay and death in service benefits. The industry that I'm in relies heavily on fixed term contracts as a way of getting experience before getting a permanent contract but I couldn't apply for fixed terms and subsequently am in a similar role to what I was doing 4 years ago whilst my peers are now at least two grades ahead of me which is where you want to be before having kids. I did manage to do a year secondment from my role and the secondment team wanted me permanently (so offered a fixed term as standard) but I couldn't take it up, then HR got involved and told them it was unfair when they tried to change the terms so I could take the role. When I eventually go back I will need very flexible terms whilst I get myself back into work which my current role offers as they trust me, but I'm very very bored by it and I also hate the idea of being around people who don't know me from before I was ill or really even before I went off on mat leave and will pity me for being "the old woman" in the team. This is without the fact that my work is in zone one and I live in zone six, so the commute is about an hour each way which I don't know if I want to do but then zone one is where all of the money is in my industry, so if I did a full time post closer to home I'd be taking home less than if I did 3 days a week in my current going nowhere job. So in short it's more I feel like a failure compared to my peer colleagues and friends as they've got to the ideal point for having babies in their industry whereas I haven't and feel I've now lost my chance, which I resent even though I know that's irrational. Hmm.

Thanks everyone for asking and thinking about us. I decided that yesterday was the day that we were going to crack falling asleep in his cot. I put him down for a nap at 12oclock and ten minutes later he was fast asleep. I felt rather smug as I sorted out some washing and put on another load. Queue 20 minutes later, he woke up in what I'm not sure was a panic or annoyance that'd I'd left him. An hour an a half later he's screaming at the top of his lungs still. I gave up and let him out of his cot and took him downstairs. At 6.30 he was absolutely knackered so I took him to bed. Again, after a bottle and about 15 minutes, he was fast asleep. At 11oclock he woke up, screamed for hours. Literally hours. He didn't want milk. He didn't want anything but to fall asleep on me. I gave in and held him. He fell asleep. I waited 20 minutes then put him back in his cot. He woke up and screamed. The whole cycle repeated itself until 4.30 this morning where once again I gave up and put him in bed with me. He hasn't napped today yet so I'm gearing up for a battle again tonight. What is everyone's bed time routines?
I was thinking about bath, bottle, book, bed. But he loves a bath so I think that'll wake him up a bit rather than making him nice and relaxed.

@AssumeItWasSomethingClever Oh poor you! That must have been awful. Please PM me with your email address if you want me to send you our sleep plan - it won't be completely relevant, but will give you an idea of how we went about it at the beginning. It's a bit more gentle than blunt crying-it-out, even though some crying is involved.
If you can at all afford it, might be even better to contact a sleep consultant, as they can create something tailored to your situation.
The reason the plan works best is that you know what to do and so you are more likely to stay consistent. Consistency is the key.
Our bedtime routine is boob, bath, story, bed. And my little boy loves his bath too. But if you keep the whole routine pretty mellow, it will relax him. We are now at the stage where it is pretty hard to keep the bath mellow, but we still try, do a bit of massage putting the cream on, use dimmed lights etc.

@AssumeItWasSomethingClever sounds rough... How did it go last night?

Our routine is book, bath, bottle, bed. He loves baths and ends up splashing loads in it but that doesn't seem to impact on his sleep. We put back our bedtime by an hour and it actually helped with his sleep so much. We also try to nap at similar times (currently at about 8am for an hour) and then he has a 4 hour awake window until about 1pm then he goes for his longer nap. He's currently dropping the morning nap though so will see how that goes! I've also found how well he sleeps depends on how much he's eaten during the day, as he's been going through a fussy phase and rejecting most foods and hasn't been sleeping as well as when he was doubling up on the portions etc. But if you know how to get a child to eat who refuses to open his mouth for spoons and just drops finger food on the floor with a massive grin then let me know!

I have found that recently he just cries for what feels like no reason though. He also had a habit a month or two ago of waking up at a similar time each night SCREAMING as if he was being attacked. We somehow realised that changing his nappy snapped him out of it when nothing else would, so you could try that with your baby too? He screamed a lot during the actual change but then calmed down quite rapidly afterwards whereas milk, food, hugs etc did nothing.

I have a one year old. Woop.

By put bedtime back, I mean bought it forward by an hour so he now goes to bed an hour earlier than he did. Sorry, that's a bit confusing!

@Sheeni Thank you very much! I'm on the app and can't figure out how to private message. 🤦🏻‍♀️
@Cardboard33 I hadn't drawn the link between him eating a lot and his sleep until you mentioned it! That makes a lot of sense now!
A 1 year old!! 😱 how are you feeling? I'm not usually an emotional person but I'm in bits about G's upcoming birthday!

Last night went really well. Put him to bed at about 7.30. 15 minutes later he fell asleep and stayed asleep until 2am. Gave him another bottle and didn't wake up until 7.
Going to try nap time this afternoon, that's where it hit the fan on monday! 🤞

@AssumeItWasSomethingClever I'm the same, I'm not usually emotional but writing the card was the bit that got me, I cried, haha!! I just can't believe he's one as it's been such a long year and such a short year at the same time. It was his birthday party yesterday, he only slept for 30 mins before hand and then also grabbed some cake out of my hand... Had a sugar high then slept through the night! Win! I've definitely noticed a difference in sleep now I've clocked on to the food thing... I'm now not sure if we are feeding him enough during the day and that's why he's waking up, as yesterday he ate way more than we'd normally give him as he essentially had two big lunches plus more snacks and he had one of the best night's sleep yet. How have you been getting on the last few nights? How was nap time?

Other babies must have now turned one? Still can't believe I had one of the latest due dates then ended up being one of the first to actually have their baby.

Hello ladies. I was thinking that everyone must be quiet but turns out I don't get the email notifications anymore! It's been a really rough time for us. Elliot started daycare 4 weeks ago and has literally been sick since the 3rd day. First a cold, then a stomach bug that we all caught off him, and now he has a chest, throat and ear infection. It was his first birthday last Monday and he felt miserable so we couldn't do anything other than cuddle him. Not only that, but the next morning I had to go to hospital as I'd been feeling like I was dying for a couple of weeks.. Turned out I had pneumonia! So for the first time in a year I had to spend 3 nights away from him while I was in hospital. Luckily, my husband has been amazing and coped a lot better than I would have lol. I go a bit mad when it's just me and Elliot all day long. My mood has been extremely low lately. Obviously being ill hasn't helped but it's gotten to the point where I care so little about anything when I feel like that.

@Brobot there is so much going round. I've had a viral infection for 2 weeks that I can't shake and they can't give me anything for! Then on Monday E's nursery called as he had a temp that calpol and ibuprofen weren't lowering. Ended up at GP's and it was 39.9 - she said to monitor (frankly the dr was awful but my best mate is a GP so she came round after work and did her own assessment).

Then he was ill all week and although no day was as bad as Monday night, without calpol the temp was still over 38. He ended up back at the doctors on Friday and he had a throat infection so now he's on antibiotics.

Friday was also his 1st birthday so like you all plans went out the window so it was just a quiet one and I was so sick yesterday my mum had to take him for the day because I could barely move off the sofa.

I'll be glad when we're both over these infections!

Hey how is everyone doing ? With this crazy pandemic! Hope no one on here has been affected . I work In the hospital so just trying to be extra cautious.

My LO is 1 a week on sunday . Wanted to take her to the zoo but not sure what the situation is going to be like .

Still struggling on the sleep front. Feel like I'm going to have a melt down . I have not slept longer than 3 hours without having to get up since she was born. My partner has full nights sleep 5 days of the week whilst the other two I am on night shift . I'm fed up . I am still breast feeding . Only 3x a day now . Have dropped the night feeds . She did for a week sleep slightly better but now it's back to the hourly and 2 hourly wake ups. Goes back to sleep if we rock her or pat her bum . I have never left her to cry but I'm on the verge of just letting her cry out as I'm honestly exhausted . Just need one full nights of sleep . I ask my partner but it's no use . I need to be asleep at a different house if I'm not to be disturbed . I just cant see a light at the end of the tunnel. Why cant she sleep for longer than a couple of hours! She eats really really well. Just getting fed up with working days and nights and getting no rest in between.

@Jenlou1992 We were visiting family in Czech Republic and just returned yesterday. Barely made it as CZ closed borders yesterday afternoon. We were already at the airport and there was even a discussion whether they'll let us on the plane or not. I would be chill about this before becoming a parent, but everything is so much more complicated with a baby.
Btw I sent you a PM regarding the sleep - don't want to spam here again.

What is everyone doing for their LOs birthdays now that we're almost on lockdown?
We had planned a party at a local pub which has an incredible garden and play park. We were going to have grandparents round for the morning and then go to the local zoo. We'd planned for a local baker to do us a teletubbies cake. Now it's all gone out the window. ☹️😭
I really want to do something that makes it different from any other ordinary day but I can't wrack my brain of what to do!

Sleeping is much better. Fingers crossed, touch wood, try not to jinx it!!! He goes to sleep a lot easier, in his cot at night within about 15 minutes of me putting him down. He then sleeps through til about 5 and then wakes up for the day at 7/8. Naps are still tricky. He'll fall asleep in his cot for about half an hour if he's really tired. Otherwise it's still on me.

How's everyone doing? Has anyone had to go into isolation yet?

@assumeitwassomethingclever I had a similar situation in that I had stuff planned and then we were both sick so had to cancel it. Ended up just going to my mums and having a nice day with her - which I'm now very glad about because she's in her 70's so is now in isolation.

Is there a National Trust place near you that you could go to?

@Assumeitwassomethingclever Glad the sleep is going better. Fingers crossed you'll get the naps sorted eventually, too.

My LO is 1 on Sunday. I'm praying for good weather, so we can go for a nice walk or to a nearby farm, if it's still open. Otherwise we'll just chill, eat some cake, video call the family and that's it. He won't remember anyway!

I had planned to go to the zoo for her birthday which is 1 week on sunday . Might take her this weekend and dont know if it will be open next weekend . Otherwise just going to go for a stroll. Cant believe everything that's going on . Really pray it blows over soon .

Hi everyone, crazy crazy times we are living in... All credit to @Jenlou1992 and anyone else who is a key worker... Make sure you keep yourself safe though! How is it in your hospital?

Sorry to hear a lot of you have had to rearrange your birthday parties etc. It's mad thinking that ours was less than two weeks ago and no one had any concerns about socialising. We are now so glad that he was born quite early! I'm not sure what will happen with my health stuff, waiting to find out if it will go ahead at the end of the month. I technically should be self isolating for 12 weeks as of this weekend but that's hardly gonna work with a baby so I'm just being as sensible as I can.

Also does anyone else think that babies around one are the worst for keeping entertained. If they were a year or so older then you'd be able to leave them to play by themselves more and if they were younger then they'd be ok with minimal interaction/they sleep for longer whereas as it is you can't ever get anything done because you constantly have to be with them. I really hope mine doesn't proceed with dropping his morning nap any time soon, he was starting to do it around the beginning of the month but for both of our sanity I feel like I need the extra hour to myself.