a true fact about Story

She almost always falls asleep looking like she's ready to fight whoever tries to wake her up. She clenches her little fists and looks like she's ready to rumble.

I find this precious beyond all explanation.

breastfeeding challenges...Again?

Just got back from the pediatrician and I'm pretty stressed/bummed out. Turns out that Story has not gained a single ounce since last week, which is really troubling. The pediatrician didn't seem to be very worried, but she still asked us to come in next week for a follow-up to make sure she's gaining weight.

This first started out as a worry when we came home from the hospital and she'd lost a pound since birth. It's pretty normal to lose weight, but it was still hard to see she'd lost that much. The doctor suggested it was probably due to my c-section recovery and the percocet I was taking. She told me that I should try to stop taking it, which I did follow for a few days. Within that time, Story gained four ounces and seemed to be on the right track. However, it was at the sacrifice of finding myself in so much pain that I could barely walk. So, I started taking it again, deciding that being able to sleep and walk was important for taking care of Story.

I have to admit though that now I'm feeling terrible about Story's lack of weight gain. I know, if the pediatrician isn't really worried, it's probably fine. But still, I feel so bad. I definitely notice the difference in the two days since I've stopped taking the percocet. Story is much more alert in the daytime, she seems to be feeding better (before she'd fall asleep while feeding and I'd constantly have to wake her up... it still happens now but not as often), and she's been responding well to on-demand feeding. So, hopefully her weight will go up.

It just makes me feel like a failure to not have her gaining weight back. I feel like feeding her is my number one job right now, so it sucks that she's not climbing back up steadily. I kind of blame myself for not being tough enough to have stopped taking the percocet the first time around, but I know that's silly. Still, I feel like our society makes breastfeeding such a "natural" thing that not doing so well at it makes women feel like there's something wrong with them, like me.

I think the only thing I can do is try to remain positive and focus on keeping up our feeding routine. If we go back next week and she's not doing better, then it will probably come down to formula supplementing/pumping to supplement. Cross your fingers for us!

cheesy, but true

"You think you know how much you can possibly love another human being, then you have a child... and you don't believe how much you love this little person. It seems impossible, but it's true."

Though I've always rolled my eyes and thought it was cheesy when people said this to me, I can't argue against it now. Story is just the greatest and best thing ever. Ever ever ever.

I should note that Story has become the most enjoyable baby in the past week. She's wide awake and barely fussy, she sleeps well, she enjoys playing with both mommy and daddy. She even has favorite activities, like: staring at the curtains, eating her fists and checking stuff out. I can't wait until she gets even more active so we can play with some of the awesome toys she has.

If any of you out there are soon to be moms/recent moms and struggle with a baby, the only advice I give you is this: ditch the books. Ditch the books and ditch the well-intentioned declarations and advice from friends, family and online groups. Parent by your instinct, it won't let you down. Sure, consult doctors and other resources with questions you have, but, in the end, follow your heart. Every baby is different and you know how to parent your child. Trust me, once I stopped trying all these random "methods" for soothing and making Story happy and just paid attention to what my gut said, life has been FABULOUS!

:)

Good stuff

OK, so I've done a lot of venting and all on this blog lately, which is good for the sanity. But I don't want to make it seem like life has been one hard patch lately. There have been quite a few awesome things that have happened, so I figured I'd list them...

*Story had her first bath in the kitchen sink. Yup, she's a sink baby. I gave her the bath while daddy took pictures and she HATED every moment of it. It was really precious, though.

*Our loverly friends, Jess and Greg, gave us a swing that she adores. We put her in it last night and she swung while watching It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I am happy to report that she seemed entranced by this show. Thanks again Jess and Greg!

*Story has had two nights in a row sleeping in her crib, getting 3-4 hour blocks of rest and going to be fairly fuss free. We still stop in all the time to check on her (it's actually harder to not freak out when she's being so peaceful and sleepy, LOL) and pat/reassure her. But two whole nights of no screaming/wailing!

*Story played on her rainforest tummy/back play mat for quite some time today and had a blast. Though we think she was more entranced by the curtains in the dining room than the play set.

*Story had the most explosive poop ever today. OMG she was hanging out with daddy in the dining room and I could hear it while I hung out in the living room, it was THAT loud. She also seemed very happy and proud of this.

*I got to take Story on a walk around the neighborhood with Tim yesterday afternoon. It was a bit hard, as I still had some painful moments, but it felt SO GOOD to be out and about, getting fresh air. Story also really seems to like it, though the bumpy ride makes her sleepy.

There's been a lot of other awesome moments, but gushing about them all would probably annoy the heck out of you all. But I'll just say this- she is the coolest thing and I'm so glad she exists. I really can't wait until I heal more so we can go on more walks and a day trip here and there. For now, it's great to enjoy her company and get to spend a lot of lazy days on the couch with her.

so much information

I think one of the hardest things about being a new parent is all the information that gets thrown your way. It seems like there is a book for everything and a million and one approaches to parenting. I get so daunted by all of the methods and approaches to child rearing, especially since I view a lot of them as ways to make a buck off of sleep deprived, stressed out parents.

That said, in the past week I've been reading The Baby Whisperer, The Sears Book of Sleep and even Tim's Be Prepared book for dads. Though I still feel like each of them has their own style that doesn't totally fit what we're into, it's good to get some tips from each source that work and make Story happy. Those, combined with some awesome moms I know who read this blog, has definitely made a good impact on Story in the first week at home.

One of the best things that's happened already is that she seems to actually like her crib. At first, we were co-sleeping with her and we were finding it to be a bit problematic. First off, it made me really nervous to have her hanging out in our bed, especially since I have been on pain meds for the c-section. Also, she seemed to be much fussier, crankier and prone to mixing up her night and day. But whenever we'd put her in her bassinette, she'd cry non-stop. Definitely no fun.

Our pediatrician suggested establishing a firm difference between night and day by having loud tv/activity on during the day and keeping the house dark and quiet at night. She also suggested letting her CIO (cry it out) in the crib until she fell asleep. I'll admit that I'm not too keen on that, even though it was how I was raised. So, we tried putting her in her crib and using some of the soothing methods we learned in Newborn Care class (swaddling, of which Tim is AMAZING at and shushing/white noise.) Then, Tim and I turned on the monitor and visited/soothed every time she woke up or started crying. Immediately, we noticed a huge difference. She has been happily going to sleep at night, sleeping for longer stretches each time and only waking up really for feedings. She also seems SO much happier during the day, being alert and playful. I think we were both really stressing her out/keeping her up too much with our "soothing" methods of bouncing, rocking, singing, etc. every time she woke up before.

It's definitely not perfect. She's a little person who has been thrown into this bizarre world, so she still wakes and needs soothing (or I have to wake her for feedings, which is so hard to do. She looks so sweet and precious, I just want to let her sleep... but a mom's gotta do what she's gotta do.) But it's amazing how she's gone from screaming/crying in large blocks during the day to being happy and alert.

However, we'll see how long this lasts. As I've said before, this parenting stuff seems like one giant experiment, so who knows if next week she'll be a totally different baby with a whole new set of rules :)

first family photo

Taken this morning after breakfast. I'm proud to say I don't look AS high as I usually do in all my pictures. Tim and Story are naturals, of course :)

a hard day with a good ending

Warning: LONG LONG POST :)

Yesterday was my birthday and I wish I could say it was easy, happy and full of sunshine and unicorns. Instead, it was full of doctor's appointments, rushing around, lots of pain, discomfort, a screaming baby and a breakdown on my part. But, like I said, it ended really well and there were some great breakthroughs as well.

On Thursday, I got hooked up to a Holter monitor for my heart. When having my c-section, I had a bout of ventricular tachycardia, which can be a possibly life threatening event. However, they really believe it was a random occurrence brought on by the suddenness of the surgery, my anxiety level and, in my opinion, the drugs they gave me to stop my contractions (which they told me would make my heart race like crazy...) Even though they did several rounds of tests and believe I'm fine, they wanted me to do a 24 hour monitor to make sure. This means that I had to have five electrodes and a monitor unit strapped to me for a whole day, while trying to manage a new baby and breastfeeding. On top of that, I had to write down every time I ate something, went to the bathroom, had an "extreme emotion" (laughing, crying, fright, etc.), took medication, breastfeed, drank caffeine and any other event which might be reflected in a change in heart rate. It was really rough, especially since Story kept on trying to pull out my nodes all the time while breastfeeding.

And on Thursday, Story had a rough night. She started crying at about 11pm and it went on through the morning, until about 10 a.m. with a few pauses in between. Neither Tim or I could figure out what was going on. I kept feeding her, we changed her, tried to put her down for naps and nothing worked.

So my birthday morning started out with a cranky baby and these itchy nodes on me that made life annoying. Still, I fixed Tim and I some pancakes and bacon while Story was in her bassinet, because I just needed some time to myself. Then, it was on to the pediatrician for a check up. Good news is that Story is gaining weight, which means her feedings are going well. And the pediatrician gave us some great advice about sleeping and acclimating her to night versus day. She told us to establish clearly that day = being awake: loud tv, cleaning, talking, friends/visitors, only allowing short naps for Story, etc. Night = low lights, soft tv if anything, winding down and putting story in her crib to sleep. I asked her about crying, because Story would cry the instant we put her in a crib. The pediatrician said that letting her cry is fine as long as we're sure all her needs are met... that babies need that to settle down and learn coping. We decided to give it a go.

After this appointment, we headed up to Annapolis to drop off my Holter monitor and get my prescription for UTI meds. Yup, I have a UTI. I believe I got it from the hospital, since there were a few times when my catheter bag needed to be refilled/was backed up and it took forever for a nurse to respond. On one occasion, the nurse was like, "oh no, it's draining fine," and I responded, "no, I can feel it backed up, my bladder feels like it's a strained balloon... Please dump the bag for me." Anyways, I now was dealing with c-section healing and an inflammed/painful bladder. JOY :) So, I was given meds from my ob/gyn to solve the problem, but I had to pick them up.

Upon picking them up, I found out they suspend your employee pharmacy card when you're on leave at the hospital I work at. It would have been nice if they'd let me know that. Instead, here I was with no cash, just my employee badge/card and a diaper bag. Thanks to a kind stranger, I was able to pay the $.70 for my prescriptions and get some relief. I'm so glad there are kind souls left in this world.

By this time, it's 12:30 p.m. or so and I'm starving. But we wanted to eat/be stationed at home, so we traveled back home. On the way back, we went by Trader Joe's to get me some cranberry juice and snacks, then on to the liquor store for my birthday treats- a bottle of nice red wine and some pumpkin beer. Even though I'm still on meds (though I stopped taking my percocet b/c I was disturbed with how it might effect Story), I had decided to delay my motrin so I could have a glass of wine. We got to introduce Story to our local liquor store owner, whom we adore, and he was just thrilled to see her. Then it was on to home.

Next commences hours of screaming baby, episodes of "it hurts when I pee," and extremely exhausted Tim and Brooke trying to cope. Because of stopping my percocet, I was in so much pain from my incision and the UTI. Delaying the motrin didn't help either. And I was on about 3 or 4 hours of sleep, so the world was foggy and horrible. Around 4p.m. I had an extreme breakdown. I couldn't stop crying because I felt like I was the third wheel in our family- Story seemed to be so much happier with Tim than me, I was just a set of milk bags who had no idea how to comfort her, I was unable to do so many basic things still because of my healing, I couldn't sleep through her wailing in her co-sleeper and I just felt like everyone would be better off without me. I admitted to tim that I felt so stressed that I felt like I was letting him and Story down.

He immediately told me to go take a nap while he took story on a walk around the neighborhood. He told me that my feelings were totally normal and expected: it was a combination of hormones and baby blues, that I was doing so much better than I thought and that neither of them were let down. He reminded me that Story sometimes will only calm down for me, that I am great at feeding and taking care of her, that I help support him by constantly telling him how wonderful he's doing. He also reminded me that being in a lot of pain makes every task that much harder. That keeping my calm is that much harder because I'm dealing with healing and pain management as well. It made me feel a lot better, though I still cried myself to sleep once they left.

Once dinner rolled around, about 7ish, we decided it was time to put Story in her crib and take a stab at acclimating her to night versus day. It was hard to hear her cry through the monitor, but it only lasted about 30 minutes before we heard her calm down and then it was quiet. She was actually sleeping! We both couldn't believe it. Even though she would only do it in a few hour spurts, she was beginning to get used to her crib! It was the first good turn of the night. Then, we started getting Trick or Treaters. Watching Tim's delight at giving them candy was awesome. It was also great to imagine next year, when I can take our little Story around for first Trick or Treating! I had my glass of wine and started to chill out a bit.

But I was still in so much pain. I could barely get up and down the stairs because of delaying my motrin. Tim finally looked at me and said, "you HAVE to start taking the percocet again, Brooke. I know you don't want to, but you've been so stressed and in so much pain since you stopped that you're breaking down and that's not good for any of us. Your ob/gyn gave you this on purpose, because it's better to manage your pain and be able to be a good mom than to deny medication and be miserable." I finally gave in and it was the best choice. Within an hour, I was feeling so much better and was totally unphased by Story's crying and could deal with her with compassion and kindness, instead of crying and self-blaming. I don't want to take these for too long, but at least for the next week like they suggested.

So, the night did end on a good note. Story slept in several 4 hour blocks through the night, she's happy and alert today, I've finally mastered cluster feeding and I feel refreshed and pain-free. I don't know if this will last, as it seems every time we have a pattern established with Story she changes it up, but I hope so! I feel like I made it through a really rough patch though and was able to learn some really good lessons about myself- I can't ignore doctor's orders because I think I should be some superwoman who can just live with pain. That doesn't make me a better wife or mother. And I have to be able to put Story in her crib and walk away sometimes. Monitors exist for a reason. And maybe what she needs is some alone time to decompress.