May 2009 - loved-up new mums and/or sleep-deprived zombies this way please

[pulapula]

Here's a nice new thread for us to share our experiences with our new LOs.

Well i was feeling very fed up earlier as i was tired and grumpy and it was hard to figure out when/how we could get out of the house with 3 kids and where we could go. What with DS1s nap, and DS2s feeds/sleeps i was feeling trapped in the house. Anyway we finally made it out at 3.30 after DS2s feed, and he slept throughout our trip to the park, tea and icecreams so i feel a lot more normal and happier for getting some sun . It's hard work this 3 kids business.

It's very quiet on here tonight. DS2 has just been wide awake and feeding pretty much for 2 hours. I hope i can get him to bed now and that he will give me a few hours shut-eye before he wants more milk!

Just wondering for those with babies over 3 weeks old, have you noticed any growth spurts? I've read they often have them at 3 (or 4) weeks.

oh, he's stirring again....

pula, Harper is 3 weeks old - i'll let you know if I notice agrowth spurt. nothing noticeable at themo.

3kids business: it is tough but I've had my inlaws this weekend so the work is split and I've just been able to spend time with baby. i do find it diff to get out of the house earlier than 4pm.

mine is stirring too!

3kids - yup, tough tough tough ! I am not finding it so difficult to adjust as I did going from 1 to 2 DC but it's just there aren't enough minutes in the day to get everything done ! I think it's because I have got used to having my hands free to do stuff, but G is really clingy and won't be put down for more than a minute or 2 before screaming. Pula I am really glad you managed to escape the house and had a nice afternoon. Monimo, glad your inlaws are there to help. Not sure about growth spurts. My LO is putting on just under a lb a week which feels like a growth spurt, just constant ! Maybe Belgian will know when they are most likely to occur?

My DH has miraculously changed into someone that is actually helping around the house and with the kids, when he would never have considered it before. I figure it's because I just can't physically do it all anymore, so long may it continue !

I hope that everyone has good nights tonight. I'm off to sleep while G is sleeping and keeping my fingers crossed it will be the same as last night, as that would be lovely

3 week growth spurt...maybe! G hasn't stopped feeding this evening and has been really restless. To make things worse, I couldn't sleep last night and tossed and turned inbetween the midnight feed and the 3am feed. I felt very miserable this morning!

Morning ladies!

Hope everyone is doing well today!

I am finding it hard to find the time to post but I am trying to read when I can I posted on the other thread too...very proud! lol

I am also doing the boob jiggle which makes DH laugh. At least someone is laughing eh? I seem to always be full though even after she has fed. Hope it settles down soon though!

Finally put pictures of Sara on FB too.
I am feeling the drop in hormones big time. I was very tearful yesterday. Think I am just trying to do to much. I am also tossing around the idea to stop BFing as I am finding it very hard with an 18 month old running around. S eats all the time and I don't have the time or hands to give to DD1. Just worried about when DH goes back to work. BF is going so well though that I would feel bad to stop just because it would be easier for me...not sure what to do!

Well that is S up again! Hope everyone has a great day!

emmab's, i know what you mean - BF can be so time-consuming. for us, it's inevitable that one of the 3 is yelling around mealtime/feeding. i'm getting used to it though .

re: feeds, MW said we need about 6 feeds in 24 hrs but last night, Harper only had 5, her last feed was between 6-730pm (cluster feed). i went to bed thinking she'd wake around 11pm-12am but she didn't wake until 3.30am. whilst i don't mind a long stretch of sleep , i want to be sure she's getting enough. but she'd wake me if she were hungry right? do any of you wake your babies up before you go to sleep if they don't wake you?

Momino- don't worry, i'm sure she'd wake you if she was hungry! Enjoy. She will make it up in her day feeds. DS2 is downstairs with us in the evenings and feeds quite a lot, but with DS1 we put him to bed around 7.30 and he might or might not wake up for feeds before we went to bed. We started dream-feeding at some stage where he'd have a bottle of EBM at 11 whether he'd woken or not.

I was feeling proud that S had made it through til 3.30am too but he'd fed pretty much on and off from 8-11.30pm rather than slept like little H . But 4 hours is better than the usual 3.

AAAHH, I just wrote quite a bit and turned to pick C out of the pram as she was screaming and must have accidentially hit delete. Everything is gone!

Since yesterday I'm on my own for my 1st 9 day stretch without dh. All going well at the moment.

C is now finally feeding for longer and so lasting longer, but she still doesn't drop off after a feed and so feeds, spends 30min-1h alert and awake and then screams because she's tired and she's just rubbish at getting herself off to sleep. I'm refusing to put her to the breast again, just so she can go to sleep. Don't want to get into a bad habbit, so we spend a while listening to her cry, rocking her etc... until she's finally off to sleep, which can take a while.

C's wearing a little girly dress for the 1st time in her life today . So cute.

boob jiggles I do the same. You're supposed to start each feed at the breast they didn't feed from, though C does both breasts. So I start from the one she finished on last feed. I intended to use a bracelet or something to remind myself, but same her, I forget to move it, so I'm now using the boob jiggle technique too

poos Well, my 1st poo was on day 3 or 4. I tried to drink plenty and have plenty of fibre in my diet until I went for the 1st time. Now I've gone back to my normal bad diet Need to stop that though, I've weighed myself and I've actually gained weight over the weekend. It's all the alcohol I had I think because we've been out for a drink and had a bottle of champagne too to celebrate C's birth. It had been in the fridge ever since the 11th and we'd never got round to drinking it until this Sat.

sleep C feeds OK at night, but the last 3 nights she's gotten into a very annoying habit of grunting/snorting and stretching from about 4.30. It's all in her sleep, but very loud and keeps me awake from then onwards. I'm hoping she'll stop that soon, I'm starting to get a bit tired.

lochia Mine is still stop start. Yesterday was worse, but I suppose that was my own fault for mowing the lawn. It's a big garden and I know I shouldn't have done it, but the thought of waiting 9 days for DH to come home while it was already looking like a wilderness, was too much for me to bear.

Right, of to have some lunch now and then I might hit the shops to get some clothes that fit.

I still haven't pooed!! This is ridiculous, it's now nine days. I'm going to crap out a whole new civilisation when I get round to it! I'm doing everything right - eating loads of fruit & salads, loads of fibre, drinking plenty and my body is just not having it. I'm not feeling any urge whatsoever. I hope this doesn't mean that my pelvic floor has just died a death

I do more of a boob honk than a boob jiggle! Greer's been really very sleepy and not massively interested in feeding - she's practically sleeping through the night which isn't really a great attribute in a one week old child. She's producing plenty of wet and dirty nappies though and possetting milk so she's clearly getting what she needs? Ugh.

blotted Boob honk here too. From above rather than weighing the melons from below. I too have a very sleepy little girl. I've had to stop swaddling her, she sleeps too long.

emmabemma Glad Bf is going well, but bottle feeding is also difficult to fit in with other dc. I don't think I could cope with it, having to sterilise and prepare bottles. Have you tried a sling?

blotted think how much weight you'll loose when you eventually go

Emmabemmasmom- i too am considering the BF vs FF pros and cons. I guess the hour long feeds won't go on for ever- I'm sure after a while its more like 15-20 mins every 4 hours.

I am just feeling personally trapped on the sofa, whilst FF means other people can do the feeds. Today S has been feeding every 2 hours and not sleeping well in between (until now when he's asleep on my chest) so i don't get to spend much time with the other DCs (just reading books really). When I had DD and then DS1 she was OK about the BF as it meant she got to watch her favourite TV programmes on sky+ (as at least it kept her near me and not off causing mischief). But now DD and DS1 disappear out of the room and mess about (at least DH is here for now).

I am also feeling a bit down as i can't drive for another month or push the pushchair much and i like being able to just go out and about when/where i want. At least tomorrow and Weds the older DCs are in nursery so i plan to go to the NCT baby group tomorrow morning, and then we are registering DS2 and maybe shopping on Weds morning.

Oh and I've been discharged by the midwife. She came on Saturday on day 9, and exclaimed at how little writing there was in my notes. I've only had 3 visits post delivery, so I'm not surprised. I've got my physio appointment for my tummy split, and need to mention the sciatica that seems to have come back with a vengeance.

Next visit will be from Health visitor next week. She's a chocolate Teapot, but lets me get on with things so I don't mind.

I've only had two visits and I'm being discharged tomorrow - they seem to think I know what I'm doing

Do any of the BFers have babies with really stinky burps? Greer smells like she's been eating eggs

Ladies!

Have finally found a little bit of time to post here on the postnatal thread - yay!

Congratulations to everyone with new babes since my last post (which feels like about 4 months ago!) They're popping out all over aren't they?! Sorry for not name checking, but like everyone sleep deprivation is rather challenging.

All going well in the Gert household. E is quite settled, feeding well, sleeping well (of course would love her to be sleeping for longer during the night, but don't think that's to be expected of a 4 week old!).

DH went back to work last week, so have had a few days of coping alone, which has gone well and E and I have managed to get up and dressed before midday every day. An achievement?! I do wonder how you are all coping with more than one DC, but I expect that's just what you do and you get on with it. This week DH is away over night, so me and E are looking forward to a girly night, nail polish, make up, bubble bath and Dirty Dancing on DVD (or maybe that's in 10 years time?)

BF is going really well and my plan is to start expressing in a few weeks and trying E with a bottle. Am pretty anxious about this, as I don't want her to be confused and not take the breast once she's had a bottle. Can any of you give me any advice/reassurance? I'm also wondering about trying her with a cup in the meantime, which if successful would give me a bit of freedom to go to the hairdressers etc and leave her with DH or my mum without any anxiety on my part, that she'll scream the place down as I haven't fed her enough before I left (IYKWIM).

She's sleeping peacefully as I type, we've tired her out with fresh air for the past couple of days, out enjoying the sunshine.

Hope everyone has had a good bank holiday, hopefully I'll be back to post more soon.

x

Blotted love your husbands blog - great photos, especially day 1. That's so special and the kind of visual memory that would fade if not captured on camera.

Hi Gert. Don't worry about the nipple confusion thingie. I have given G a couple of bottles (when I have been completely exhausted and at the end of my tether late at night !) and he has taken to it no problems and switched back to the boob without a hitch. Unfortunately he hates Formula and every time has spewed it back up again, but I'm not surprised really as he is used to the proper stuff ! I would recommend tommee tippee bottles as they are supposed to be better for BF babies. There are also some really expensive breast like bottles in Mothercare. I think Belgian was going to try them.

Pula are you OK? You sound (understandably) pretty naffed off. Make sure you do something for yourself whilst the older DC are being looked after over the next couple of days?

Blotted Any movement yet? (!) My piles are absolute agony when I go. So much so I dread it, and have to have 5 minutes to myself afterwards to breathe through the pain. I guess I should swallow my pride and go to the Drs for something. Oh the glamour of motherhood !

G has been awake all day, so I am letting him have a quick nap while I put the DDs to bed. What a lovely weekend, weather wise. I am soooo glad we didn't go away in the van otherwise we would still be stuck in traffic ! Fingers crossed I get another 5-6 hour stretch tonight.

Gert glad everything is going well I was worried about the bottle thing too, but it was fine, H seemed a bit awkward at first but soon got the hang of it and he switched back to breast fine. One of the girls from my NCT group is breast, EBM and formula feeding and is managing fine. We are both using Tommee Tippee bottles BTW but I don't know if it makes any difference.

We've had a lovely day out to a local National Trust property and had a picnic in the grounds with 2 couples from my NCT group and their babies.

Tried tying my wrap sling before I went but we got all mixed up trying to get him in it & ended up re-tying which is awkward when out and about as it's incredibly long. I'm not getting on that well with the sling TBH; H goes in it fine if he's sleepy but he reaches a point where he's suddenly had enough & screams and screams until I get him out. I don't know why, whether he's hot, uncomfy, wants to look around or what. It's a shame as I really like the idea of the sling. There is a 'sling meet' at the local children's centre once a month so I might go to the next one (if I can find out when it is) to see if I can get any advice.

gert- i wouldnt worry about E refusing the breast after taking bottles. I have read that baby will always take from what he learnt first which is why when you start BF its best not to introduce a bottle at the same time. What you may find is E won't take a bottle, or if you don't do it regularly enough, she will "forget" how to take it- this happened with my DS1.

tummum- i don't know whether i am just tired (although my nights arent actually that bad as i'm cosleeping) or frustrated (i'm feeling a bit useless as a mum and a wife and getting quite teary about it) or whether its something more serious than that. I felt more normal and in control when we went out yesterday so i think i need to get out more. I am considering putting the older DCs in nursery 3 days a week rather than 2 as i'm not much fun, and i feel like i need to get S into a routine which will be easier if i can devote some time to it.

I've been trying to catch up on some of these pages while I'm still here in hospital.. my phone is so slow!

re #2 been trying do one today as bit uncomfortable now. not been since last thursday and after tea tonight i now have the need to go.. but bit tricky with piles in the way. had some lactulose but think i'm going to need a lot & i mean a LOT more

spangle- i put S in a sling when he's tired or unsettled and i need to move about. I find he screams if i stand still sometimes, as he likes the motion, so i just have to walk around a bit and he will go off to sleep. My problem just now was he woke up within minutes of being put down .

btw had my first post birth tummy comment this evening. dd and i had just been to the day room to fill up my water jug for the umpteenth time and stopped to chat to the lady in the bed next to me who is on day 1of post emergency cs. her mil then said so you've a while to go yet.. err no this is day 3 after for me bear in mind i am still standing holding onto the wheeled crib with dd asleep in it and i've just answered a number of questions about how i feel now i'm a few days after my cs!!

and yay the lactulose has worked and (tmi) I have just had a #2