NOV 09 - once the lights are out and the last baby has arrived safe and fine, see you here on cloud nine!

[Broodzilla]

I've just realized we're now under the "being a parent" header. I've got stage freight!

Omg, Brood that sounds horrible. You poor thing. The only thing I could think of that's not on your list is to keep humidity really high to soften snot. (Esme has had a snotty nose too since hospital, and she seems better with pacifier and on her belly, but don't know if that's coincidence or real. Might try the paci though?). Hope he'll feel better soon..

I'm so so glad I am not the only one trying to keep baby out of company. Feel all hysterical about it, and everybody else is cheerily picking out movies at germy blockbuster store with their 1-day old nb, but doctor said at this time no company for 2 months....besides of cabin fever-issue, must say that's what I'd like to do...DD1 just caught cold from friends visiting.

Toby has just failed his left-hearing test twice should I worry? Some woman with a more sophisticated machine will come and test him again. HV said not to worry but I can't help it.

We're going to write our letters to father Christmas now. I am finding it hard to be mother to more than just a baby but I'm trying really hard. I want to be absorbed in baby heaven but I can't. I have to spread myself. I snapped at DS2 today and felt terrible. He was fiddling with the pushchair while Toby was asleep. Hardly a huge crime.

Playing Christmas music here.

I really, really wish I had persevered with the BF. I know I should stop dwelling but can't help it. At least the mother and MIL aren't making 'he's just a hungry baby' comments anymore

Good tips everyone for getting our little ones to sleep better. I like the wearing t-shirt one and sitting on the matress to warm it up!

My sister recommended breastmilk for blocked noses. Apparently you have to spray it directly into the nose and after a while, lots of mucus will come out. I haven't tried it yet (as luckily Paula is still healthy) but I don't really know how to do it. Even though I am constantly leaking, my milk is only dripping which would make it a bit difficult to get it into this tiny nose.

I too hate crowds and try to avoid them. Today, I had to go to the hospital with Paula for a hip-scan. Didn't feed her before we left even though she was crying a lot but I just didn't want to spend any second longer than necessary there. But we will most likely take the plane to go home for christmas when she will be 7 weeks.

Impossible to avoid germs and crowds with two other DSs. I too have that maternal protective instinct to protect him but unless I stopped the DSs going to school I can't avoid it. I dread them being ill though... DS1 has a cold.

BBL, one of my friends had problems with the hearing test too. In the end everything was fine, apparently they had messed it up completely (forgot how and why, but they admitted that there was a problem).
I've read about a game (for slightly older ones), maybe you could try and see his reaction (but please do not worry if it doesn't work, as it is supposed to be for older ones). Take the empty roll of toilet or kitchen paper and use it as a tube to whisper something in his ear (a little "secret"). You might see if he is listening.

Breastfeeding, I still get the odd pain when baby latches on but it doesn't last for long and then I forget I'm feeding him sometimes! I had terrible cracked nipples with DS1 which caused me to give up the bf as the pain was awful. This time around I realised my nipples were starting to crack and I decided to use nipples sheilds for a couple of days with the odd feed without them ( whilst my nipples recovered). There is some conflicting advice about the sheilds but I may have given up without the help of them.

The constant feeding around the clock has eased up and we're now on better times, every 2-3 hrs. But my breasts are getting sore with the fullness - you can't win!

Baby has a cold and very congested. We are using saline drops too. We banned all visitors apart from grandparents for the first couple of weeks. But DS1 goes to pre-school and its so hard to keep the germs at bay.

Just a quick stop by for anyone who has a baby with colic - was advised Colief drops by health visitor yesterday, just tried them for the first time and he was fully winded and out for the count within ten minutes You express a little breast milk and spoon feed it to them or mix it with formula. Am totally amazed

For your amusement DS2's Christmas list:

Chiggley dvd
Lego
Big box of pens
Book with lots of stickers in
Some paints
A robot like Bobble?s (DS1)
Toy telephone
Toy fruit bowl
A pencil
Another pencil

BBL, how cute. I would have lots of pens and pencils if you need...

BBL That is soooo cute! Especially the fruit bowl! I hope Father Christmas gets him one...

Scarlotti and Pav I also had a first degree graze with no stitches and mine got loads worse on day 5. It is still not great. How do you know if it is infected? It feels sore and stingy at the minute, but as far as I can tell, no funny discharge.

Am really annoyed with DH. At the minute, I am sleeping in the lounge on the sofabed with the moses basket next to me. He is sleeping in our bed with the door shut, as he doesn't wake up and is no help in the night really. SO last night he slept from midnight til 8.30 in his bed, I shouted him in to the lounge at 8.30 and we all slept in the sofabed until 10. So he had 10 hours sleep. I had 4, max. Now HE is having a nap on the settee!!! I am feeding and said I would love a cup of tea and when should we have dinner, hoping he would get it ready and / or get me a cup of tea - he's done neither. I'm being really snappy with him cos he seems to think paternity leave is a chance for him to have some nice lie-ins and pss about on the computer / read the paper all day while I am an emtional wreck and blody knackered. OK, rant over, I feel a bit better for that.....

Katster, sorry to hear about your husband. I guess, you have to TELL him to prepare dinner. With most men you have to be really clear (and use simple sentences). I can't really complain about mine, he really did everything in the house, I only had to feed Paula. But he couldn't understand that I was an emotional wreck until I cried over something really little (maybe you could try that )

And DS1's:

An electric Percy (as in thoma the TE)
A little box of police lego
A lego game on the race track (no idea what that is?)
Horrid Henry and the Bogey Babysitter
A book of the bible
A pack of pens

Awww they are cute! Just think your babies will be writing their christmas letters in a few years from now.

Katster your DH deserves to be shouted at!

Oooh, Katster, dc1, no? Dhs need a bit of time to catch up with the reality of it, and many don't do it until dc2. I was ready to divorce dh after dd1 was born; he would play videogames until 3 am and then complain to his mum he was so tired....while I was completely on my own taking care of baby, even when sick. Sheesh, I'm still angry at that. But this time around he's really really good- helping out any which way, being lovely about it and appropriately grateful to me for taking care of baby at night. Much more like it
If in doubt, tell him to shape up. And no way can he take a nap when you can't.

kaster it will be sore and stingy whilst it's healing and be worse when urine passes over it - including any little leaks from stretched pelvic floor
As for your DH - you should be in the bedroom and him on the sofa bed (that's our rule) and he should definitely be told he needs to be helping with cooking/cleaning etc. and allowing you to nap. 10 hours sleeping when you've a newborn is downright rude.

You really need to sort it out with him though before you get even more tired and resentment starts to breed. I had this with DH last time (his first DC) and I ended up with depression as I was trying to do everything and felt he was doing nothing to help. Not saying you'd head the same way, but it's easy to fall into a rut where you are doing everything and they get away with doing little.
Sadly no amount of sighs or cryptic comments will work - plain old 'get off your arse' type comments is what you need!!

Actually Comma that's a really good point. My DH was the same! I'd forgotten. He'd sleep in every weekend when we had DS1 and I'd be up at 5.30am feeling miserable with cranky baby downstairs by myself. He left work at 6am and got home at 7pm in the week and stayed up late on his computer. He seemed to feel the tiredness quite a lot as if I didn't! It must be some sort of reality check they have to go through.

Now with DS3 he is fantastic.

Agree with others Katster, men definitely need these things spelt out to them, very slowly and possibly more than once!

As far as stuffy noses go, my mil suggested rubbing a little bit of melted butter on the bridge of baby's nose. It's an old wives tale (of which she has about a thousand) but apparently it works.

Took Anya to docs on Sunday because I was really worried about her breathing with this cold she has and they prescribed antibiotics. Didn't really want her having them so young but she was gasping for breath with chest infection. Trouble now is getting her to keep the stuff down!

For those of you who are bottle feeding, are you following the 'new' guidelines whereby you make up a new bottle at each feed? Does this not leave baby crying for ages while it cools down? We've been using the old method as wasn't aware of new guidelines until hv came out today! Not sure what to do now. Old method never did ds any harm, but...

Actually my husband isn't too bad and does lots of stuff in the house. We both sleep in the bedroom as he is not at all disturbed in his sleep. He sometimes wakes up, says: should I change her nappy? and falls asleep before I can even answer (and it wouldn't really help I suppose, except at 5 or 6am I usually accept) I think, that's actually good as I like the fact that we can both still share a room. But he now stays on the computer/TV at night and I always have to go to bed much earlier than him (he used to sleep much earlier when we were just the two of us). He keeps complaining that I have to understand that he needs time for himself too... which I can understand but he seems to think that I do have time for myself when Paula is sleeping... which is usually on my lap or on my shoulder...

Same here with DH and his first baby vs. the second.
Great book called 'Babyproofing your marriage' is worth a read and has some great tips. It also says that most guys 'step up' with number two - mainly because it takes two adults to raise two or more kids, whereas with one there is a little more slack. Slack which should be shared but which some guys seem to think belongs to them for some me time!

My DH has managed to read 3 books whilst on 2 weeks paternity I've managed about half a magazine!
He has done all the cooking though, and MIL did all the washing whilst here for the weekend so not complaining really!

Oooh, Katster, we've had exactly the same issues over here...

But before I forget (as I'm about to join in the DH bashing...) can I please raise something? All of our real names are in the facebook description which means they're visible to anyone. Not that I think anyone would be sad enough to come on here to snoop to find out what we're saying, but you never know... so basically, could someone in the moderator team hide the description? Sorry, I know I sound like a whinger, but I also know my SIL is on MN...

I've sort of accepted sucked it up (for now) as I couldn't be bothered with the constant rows, but; DH used up his leave (no pat-leave so only had 6 days annual leave to take) while we were in hospital. Despite us being in a private room and him being allowed there between 8AM-9PM daily, he only popped in for 3-4 hours each day, sometimes not even that. When he was there, he moaned about the heat/boredom/whatever. He's been in the spare room, and has (at my request) "helped" one night when I had mastitis. In our house, DH is the one who's been napping and sleeping for 8-10 hours... and yes, moaning about tiredness. In fairness, must say he's done virtually all the cooking, but still... he's out working in the day (like most DHs) and goes out biking/to do maintenance 2-3 nights of the week (and more than once has managed to time this with DSs temper tantrums at night) and either for a few hours on Sat and Sun OR more recently, all day Sat... This is despite having agreed while I was pregnant that he'd have to scale it down (ie live without his bloody precious bike) for a few weeks after the birth, as I'd find it hard going with no family around... but when it came down to it, he told me he needs fresh air and exercise and it's better for us that he gets it, and there's no way he can go without it even for a few weeks (or even ONE...) He'd changed one nappy in the first couple of weeks.

I spent the first few weeks feeling incredibly let down, disappointed and sad, as I'd imagined this cozy family life and a hands-on DH (who, I must quickly add, is not your traditional chauvinist who thinks there are women's jobs and men's jobs...) and suddenly I was all on my own. It got worse after my parents had visited, as I then had a taste of what it would be like if there was someone else around to share the worry and caring.

The reason I'm telling you this is a) you're not alone, and I'm very of those who have DHs who coo over the babies and do feeds/sit up in the night... but mostly because b) in some ways, it's got better.
Partly I believe what someone above said, that men just take longer to adjust. Partly I believe that my DH was somewhat traumatised after the labour and birth (we were left to our own devices, and I famously was "not in active labour" until they discovered the head coming out, so DH watched helplessly as I went through and unsupervised and unsupported labour with neither one of us having any idea of what was going on - with, I suppose, me having the advantage that I was most definitely NOT all with it, and just concentrated on breathing) but also, after one particularly bad argument (divorce was mentioned) he then confessed that he felt useless and didn't know what and when to do it or how to handle the baby... won't go in to details, but it left me feeling like me having a shower was inconveniencing him...

Anyway, now DS is older and a bit more "interactive" (aware of what's around him, "chatting" and smiling) DH seems to have pulled his socks up a bit.

So - I know it's infuriating. It's also really unfair and immature on their part, and frustrating and sad for you, but if you can muster the energy, take the high road and grin and bear it (and come here to went!) you may just find it gets easier.
If you've got a good relationship with your MIL/one of his friends who's had kids or someone like that, a stern talking to from them might do the trick...

TOK when I was in hospital and Ioan was having formula top ups, they made up bottles of formula and kept them in the fridge for 24 hours. We would then go and help ourselves to what we needed. If it's ok in hospital then why not at home?
With DS1 at night, we'd take up bottles with just the water in then add the powder when he woke for a feed. I had plastic dispensers that fitted in the neck of the bottle with the measured out powder in them. I'd add it, mix it then stick it in a bottle warmer for a minute or two. DS1 was never ill from it.

BBL lovely xmas lists

Thanks scarlotti, that's the way we've been doing it-filling bottles with water then adding formula as required but hv turned her nose up at it. It didn't do my ds any harm so will prob continue with this. It's reassuring to know that others are doing the same

if we are talking about bottles, what temperature should the (breast)milk have? I'm planning to express for the take off and landing when flying home for christmas to make her sucking/swallowing. But I am worried the milk would be too cold just like that. Any experience?

Brood or somebody, what is the facebook thingy about? Did i miss something?

With the formula bottles we are doing at night, I am doing the water in the bottle and then adding the milk when needed. I can't see how this could do any harm? Leah takes it at room temperature too so it makes life much easier!! I'm sticking with that as it would be so impractical making up each night bottle as we go!

Just read everyones posts and now can't remember hardly anything! How long does this baby brain last?!! I don't think I ever fully recovered after dd1, but this is getting silly! I lose track of my conversations half way through!!

As for DH's - not sure where I would put mine on the scale! He can be helpful and good but sometimes he says things and I just look at him! If Leah wakes up in the night crying when I change her nappy he looks at me doing it! He has offered to help, but it's hardly like he can actually 'help' unless he does it, but that's not likely as I'm already half way through by the time he wakes up!! He will cook dinner and things, although I do have to ask him to do it at times. He does stay up quite late playing on his xbox and things as he needs time to 'relax' after working all day! I on the other hand don't need time to relax as I'm home all day! Not that he has said that in so many words, but I can tell that's what he is thinking! He is however very good with Leah and will take her when she is crying and he is doing lots of things with dd1 so she doesn't feel left out etc. He is away for the next couple of days and nights and it was hard work putting dd1 to bed on my own as Leah was crying! Got there in the end though and now I'm enjoying Ben and Jerrys in peace as Leah is asleep too!! Heading off to bed soon actually as could do with some rest!

Quick question (sorry, tmi coming...) - Think I have piles although not totally sure. I am quite constipated (probably not helped as I'm still having quite a lot of co-codimol for the pelvic pain and stitches pain) which I think is not helping either. What can I do to make it all better?? Its horrible and I don't like it!

Oh yeah, also with the breastfeeding, two weeks in and I still get the really sharp pain when Leah first latches on. It is getting better by the day though so hoping it will stop soon! I was very close to giving up at the beginning when it was really painful (although no cracking or bleeding so feel really sorry for you all that have to deal with that) but glad I was able to stick with it.