Cute as a button

Here is a picture of Tommy dressed in his snow suit right before we were going out to the post office on 1/14/11.

Lessons Learned

My maternity leave officially ends in four days and I'm reflecting upon all that I have learned these last three months. It's amazing to think that I was pregnant only 12 weeks ago and didn't know much about babies. Since Tommy was born I learned the following:

• How to nurse a newborn and stick with it in spite of many times that I wanted to give up because I was exhausted or sore
• How to tie a Moby Wrap on in a matter of seconds and calm my baby down in minutes by wearing him close to my heart
• How to cut the smallest of fingernails 
• How to bathe a newborn in spite of the fact that he was screaming through it for almost two months
• How to soothe a baby to sleep
• How to build up a frozen breast milk supply albeit a small supply 
• I've learned about the various vaccines and have made decisions to delay or decline certain ones
• How to successfully deal with a stubborn diaper rash
• How to operate on less than five hours of sleep some nights
• How to care for a sick baby while fighting a cold myself

Some days were harder than others and I feel like a different person in these short 12 weeks. I'm extremely grateful for my baby boy and all the blessings that have come with him such as loving grandparents and the renewed closeness of friends and family. As I go back to work I will continue to learn about the wonders of motherhood and I hope I never take it for granted or complain.

To my close friends and family - Thank you all for your love and support these last few months. I couldn't have done it without you. I look forward to seeing my boy grow up and I hope that he will know each one of you in a very special way.

Learning on the job

As a new parent, I am totally learning on the job.  I neglected to read parenting books while I was pregnant.  In fact, I didn't even read any breastfeeding books. (Bianca, I did read some of the Newman book before the baby came, but it really didn't make any sense to me until the baby came.  I brought it to the hospital with me and after he was born, that book became a great resource).  So the last seven weeks have consisted of a lot of googling and second guessing myself.

When I was pregnant, we signed up for Bradley Birthing Classes but missed quite a few classes and so I told people that I would need to cram the week before the birth when I figured I would have tine to read more and practice my relaxation exercises without a full time job getting in my way.  Even now, I feel like I am cramming. I have one more month at home as a full time mommy and its killing me to know that I will only be a part time parent.  To me that means that I have alot to do before I go back to work in terms of setting a routine up for my son. Up until now, I have basically let him set the schedule for the day if he was fussy.  Other days, we went according to my schedule, but that is not what a child needs.  A child needs a consistent routine.  

I just ordered three baby books that will hopefully help me navigate my new world.  One of my biggest goals before going back to work is to get the baby on a sleep routine and sleeping longer at night.  Right now, he nurses every three hours at night and has gone as long as four hours. I don't expect this to change much, but I still need a solution that will allow both of us to sleep more. The mistake that I continue to make is that I don't put him to bed until after 10 pm most nights and so we end up sleeping until 9 in the morning.  I need to put him to bed at 8am.  The reason I have trouble with this is because I feel like I need to be laying next to him while he sleeps and I don't want to go to bed at 8am.  One of the books I ordered is the No Cry Sleep Solution book.  I'm counting on this to give me insight in a gentle approach to setting a sleep routine.  The other book I order is the Vaccine Book by Sears which I borrowed from the library and liked.  However, I want it a permanent resource for each time he gets a vaccine.  I really like the way the book is laid out and I like Sears philosophy. The third book I ordered is What to Expect the First Year.  I was not going to order this since I hate the what to expect when your pregnant book, but after reading some of the reviews, I decided to take a chance.

Okay, so now I have some of my "required reading" for learning on the job.  Like I said, I wish I would have read some parenting books ahead of time while I was pregnant.  I read alot of natural childbirth books, but that did not do  me any good considering I ended up having a c-section.

What a treasure I was given this year

After many years of trying to have a child, I feel incredibly lucky to have been blessed with my son.  When I look at him, I think about how he will grow up to be a man that I am proud of and that I will forever be grateful to God for gracing me with the love of a child.  This Christmas, I have alot to be thankful for.  All of this gratitude makes me think that I will baptise him.  Since we don't go to church, I didn't think I would baptise him, but now I think I would like to show my gratitude to God in some formal way. Also, I think it might be good to baptise him with some sort of official religion even if we don't follow it 100%.  This seems sort of silly and even hypocritical of me, however, I think it would be easier for him as a child to understand God in the context of a particular religion rather than just understanding God as nature, or claiming to be "spiritual, but not religious," like his mother.  I'm afraid that might be too abstract for a child and I'd rather give him some sort of structured religion to some degree.  He can always criticize or reject it later, but atleast I'll give him a foundation to start with.  Since I don't go to church, I need to make time to start going to church and see what I think of the Catholic church here in Hiawatha.  If I'm really turned off, I will also check out the Episcopal church in town.

Smiling in between the tears

Baby Thomas is now smiling much more and even smiles when Tom coaches him to.  This is really nice since he's been really fussy lately.  Half of the time he nurses, he ends up with painful cries afterwards from reflux and gas.  Also, he is still suffering from a yeasty diaper rash which has been around for three weeks or so.  I feel like a bad mother letting it go on for so long, but I have been trying to treat it in various ways starting with Desitin.  After seeing the pediatrician, I started treating it with nystantin and cut out citrus from my diet.  After a week, it improved but did not completely go away.  The pediatrician told me to take diary out of my diet and see how that works.  That is so hard for me and unfortunately, last week I gave in to my weakness of mozzarella cheese, yogurt milk shakes, and in the spirit of the holidays - eggnog. This week, I started treating his rash with coconut oil which is an all natural antifugal, but that is not working either, although I like the smell of it.  Next step is to remove diary from my diet. This might also help his gas and reflux which is an added bonus.  As hard as this is for me, I am telling myself that I have done it before when I was on the "fat flush" diet last summer for two weeks and so I can certainly do it again.

Rant: Self-promotion and pushy salespeople

Yesterday I wanted to get out of the house since I needed time away from the baby and so I left Tom with four ounces of milk and went off to run a few errands.  I really wanted to get a manicure and pedicure, but I also wanted to get fitted for a nursing bra since I don't think the ones I have fit me right.  So I went to the Birth Boutique in Denville.  After spending about an hour there I wished I had went for the maini/pedi.

I had been to that store when I was pregnant to get a few things.  I remember the owner of the store being really pushy - telling me to sign up for her birthing class before it booked up and also pushing me to buy her breastfeeding DVD.  I didn't like her then and I don't like her now.  I had shared with the salesperson that I had sore nipples and she started to try and convince me to set up a consult with the owner of the store who is a lactation consultant.  I had explained that I already saw a consultant in Chatam.  She continued to try and get me in for that afternoon.  While I was in the dressing room I remembered that the pediatrician in the hospital told me not to go to the lactation consultant in Denville.  Then I also remembered how much I didn't like her many months ago when I was pregnant.  The sales woman continued to be pushy and I knew that I needed an exit plan.  I didn't think she was fitting me right for the bras (she only measured my back and not the circumference around my chest) and none of them felt right.  Upon me leaving the dressing room, the sales person ambushed me again and asked what time I wanted to come back to see the owner for a consult.  I said that I needed to talk with her first to understand her general philosophy. 

She came out of her office and everything she shared with me was counter to what La Leche League and other breastfeeding experts say.  She acknowledged that it was a completely different approach. First of all, she does not believe in nipple confusion and even introduces a bottle within the first week. She said that it should not be taking a five week old baby 30 minutes to nurse and that she could show me how to get him to nurse on both breasts in under 10 minutes.  I asked if this would cause a hindmilk/foremilk imbalance and she said no.  She said that the imbalance issue is only a problem in the first two weeks when the breasts are engorged.  She could tell that I was skeptical and didn't believe her and so she started to tell me how she is the expert for Babies R Us and how she is leaving for a speaking engagement in Washington next week and so if I want to meet with her I would need to come right away.  I told her that I needed to digest what she was telling me first and think it over.

Needless to say, she continued to promote herself as a renowned expert - even claiming to be a national expert.  The other thing that annoyed me was how she was undermining the consultant I saw in Chatam.  Clearly, they all know eachother and some of the things she said were meant to convey that I received bad advice.  Although I am still having difficultly, I trust the woman in Chatam 100 times more than this woman in Denville.  Unlike the Denville woman, the woman in Chatam is not self-promoting.  She doesn't encourage me to buy anything (although she has a store as well) and her philosophy is simple - use the baby as your guide.  Thank God, I remembered how the pediatrican warned me against the woman in Denville.  And thank God that I saw Maria in Chatam first since I might have fallen under the Birth Boutique's woman's spell of self-promotion in my delicate post-partum state.  Next time, I'll just get the mani/pedi and relax.

Baby, its cold outside

It's winter time!!!