The 'old' not a mum me seems like a distant memory now. I can barely remember what it felt like pre Pads and wonder at how I managed to fit so much into my days, and nights. I have become completely accustomed to my new routine and way of life now where my days revolve around 3 main jobs: breastfeeding, changing nappies and getting some sleep (both for me and Pads), along with a few other tasks: sterilising, expressing, playing developmental games and just trying to keep us all alive and thriving. I am constantly surprised how this seemingly short 'to do' list takes up the entire day - and night - leaving me with no time for anything else and sometimes struggling to just fit those things in. It's a juggling act for sure and everything always takes twice, nay, three times as long with a baby in tow.
I wouldn't swap this new life for the old one though, even in the darkest moments, as at the end of the day, I have a gorgeous, happy son who makes my heart do funny things and makes my face ache with smiling. My life is all the more richer and full of purpose because of him. I guess you could say that I am head over heels for my boy and love being his mum.
This week has been varied and full, and here's what we learnt from it.
1. Lazy lady. I started wondering if I was becoming 'lazy' mum with my breastfeeding pillow, my nursing poncho, side lying breastfeeding at night, electric pump etc...then my friend Gemma snapped me out of my guilt trap with the sage words 'you just have to do whatever makes your life easier when it comes to having kids' and she is so right. All of the above still mean that I provide my son with nourishing breast milk, in fact they have been helping that to happen and allow me to always be able to feed comfortably and frequently no matter how tired/out of sorts or out of our routine we are, so don't feel guilty for finding things that make being a parent easier - cherish them, share them with others and rejoice that you have them in your life.
2. The Abergavenny Food 'Breast'ival. We are big fans of food and big fans of the Abergavenny food festival and have been going for years. This year was obviously different with our little one by our side and I ended up breastfeeding Pads in the grounds of Abergavenny castle sat on a narrow bench next to award winning chef (of The Hardwick restaurant), Stephen Terry (who was also a former guest of mine on several shows in my former life as a food tv producer) and his family, with my boob basically right out there on show as I had forgotten to pack my nursing poncho for the first time since getting it. It didn't really bother me, or him thankfully, as I need to feed my son first and foremost so I am not going to be shy about it, but it did get me thinking that there really should be more dedicated breastfeeding areas at events like this, whether it be a food or music festival. A small tent or cordoned off zone with seats, free water on tap (and perhaps a biscuit or two?!) for breastfeeding, or bottle feeding, mums to pop in and feed in comfort and out of the glare of the crowds should they so wish. I may make this my mission for next year's festival and bring it up with the organisers, who's with me?!!
3. Voyage of discovery. This week little man definitely discovered his legs - it started with a staring session at his own knee then he outstretched the whole leg and was mesmerised by the movement of stretching the leg out then bringing the knee back in. He has also started splashing in the bath by kicking his legs out wildly and we have been reacting by laughing and making a big fuss at how much fun it is, which made him then grin and do his almost-laugh, and kick again to get another reaction from us. Each time he kicked, he looked at us and we gave a big encouraging, excited reaction. Bloody brilliant. That's up there with one of the best parenting moments we've had yet.
4. 9th percentile panic. If this had happened to someone else I would know exactly what to say and mean it too: 'do not worry, every baby is different', 'as long as he is still gaining weight, happy and is doing plenty of poos and wees he will be fine', 'those charts are a guide - somebody has to be in the 9th percentile and you just have a small baby' etc etc...However, when we got Pads weighed this week and he had only put on 13lbs in 20 days and dropped a percentile I went into panic mode quickly followed by bursting into tears mode and blaming myself and my milk supply mode. I then wondered if my attempts at trying to express and build up a milk bank had meant that he wasn't getting those extra potential 'feeds' but I thought expressing was supposed to increase your milk supply so surely this shouldn't be a problem, right?! We breastfeed every 2-3 hrs in the day, sometimes just 1 breast and sometimes 2. I take the cue from him whether to offer up the 2nd boob and I think/thought/don't know anymore, that we were doing fine. We had found our rhythm, I thought, and I wasn't worried about breastfeeding - I thought we had that bit down. Now, I am not so sure. I am not even sure if I should be unsure. It's such an emotional, massive part of being a new mum this feeding your baby malarkey and you just want to get it right and nourish your baby so that he grows up big and strong and when you think you aren't doing that it's like someone has just kicked you in the gut and you feel like you've failed. And you blame yourself and your milk supply first, always.
I asked the health visitor what I could do as I think our feeding frequency is fine and she suggested I make sure I drink more fluids (I could be guilty of not always drinking enough actually), eat well (I am pretty sure I do this already) and get more rest (ha! As if!), so I am now sitting here (resting), having just had some blueberries (eating well) and have 3 glasses of water all lined up in front of me whilst I breastfeed. I really hope this makes a difference as we have to go and get weighed again next week now to check that he isn't dropping off the chart anymore. Could it not be that it is still good that he is gaining weight and is just going to be slight or that because he is so tall, he takes longer to fill?!! He is also in the 9th percentile for height, meaning that he is tall for his age so surely this has to be taken into account. Thanks to Laura again for sharing your growth chart woes with me and reminding me not to get too het up on them, as long as he is happy, healthy and filling his nappies with frequency, then we are doing ok. (My hubby Jon also pointed out that it could be that the charts are based on averages of a population which is actually fairly obese so as he is clearly not going to be an obese baby or adult, he doesn't fit the averages or the chart which might not be such a bad thing anyway. Just a theory but could be some truth in it.
5. New poo. We have had a brand new nappy filling this week, and it was green tinged, stringy and mucusy. We checked with the health visitor who said it was probably caused by him being extra drooly and not digesting his saliva so it shows up in his poop. So apparently nothing to worry about. However, then he did a full on dark green poo a few days later that smelt awful. Like poo on acid, literally. This is not such a good sign as I'll explain below, it either indicates poor breastfeeding or an infection. Not a colour of poop that you want to see.
6. Breastfeeding - on and off again. Shortly after writing point 1, our breastfeeding, which had been going well I thought, took a nose dive. Pads didn't do any poos in a whole day, just wees, and then the next morning he did a big explosive very green acidic smelling poo that did not look right, as I mentioned above. I googled what this could mean (I know!, but I needed a quick answer) and read on numerous reputable sites, i.e babycentre.co.uk and Nhs.co.uk that this could be a sign that breastfeeding isn't going well, or if it lasts over 24hours, possible infection.
Now, the fact that Pads isn't gaining as much weight as the health visitor would expect and he has been a bit fussier and grizzlier the past 2 days would seem to indicate to me that the green poop incident is his way of telling me that we have forgotten how to breastfeed again and that he isn't latching properly or getting all that yummy rich, fatty hind milk. Crap. There's a kick in the teeth. I really thought we'd got good at breastfeeding. I felt comfortable with how we were doing it and thought he was happy and healthy as he was doing 6-8 nappies a day, a mix of wet and poopy. Now, it seems something has changed so we need to go back to breastfeeding school.
No need to panic, just time to get pro active, so I called the National Breastfeeding Helpline as I wanted a second opinion on the green poo and to talk through our breastfeeding ritual and we agreed that it sounded like he was just getting the sugary watery fore milk which can lead to green nappies and poor weight gain, and that this was probably because the latch wasn't' right. So she talked me through the latch again and holding him with my forearm along his back, hand holding his shoulders and neck - I have been doing more of a cradle hold which could be causing his head to tuck too far in rather than allowing it the freedom to tip back or when doing the forearm hold I had then been supporting his head rather than his shoulders, again restricting his important head movement. It felt really uncomfortable with the adjusted arm hold and he started fussing a lot at the nipple, perhaps because I was anxious and feeling a bit upset about not having a grip on the one thing I thought we had a grip on. She also suggested compressing the breast when his rhythm starts to slow down as he has started getting sleepier and lazier on the boob this past week so again, perhaps not getting to the really good stuff milk wise, so I tried this and it did start him sucking more rhythmically again but it is making my boobs sore again (memories of week 1 and 2 come flooding back).
I then asked her about expressing as I was hoping this would increase my milk flow but it doesn't seem to have so far and we are over 2 weeks in. She asked how I was doing it and I said after feeding him I would then express off the alternate breast, then the next breast. She suggested I first express off the breast he has just finished to try and encourage more of the fatty hind milk out and make the breast work harder, then do a little of the second breast but not to drain it as Pads may want it sooner than it can refill and to try and do this a couple of times a day if poss. Minor adjustments that we can definitely start making.
The gutting thing about all of this is we now have to work at each feed again like at the beginning and I need to watch out for the all the things I thought we were doing but clearly aren't anymore: wide latch, head back and able to move freely, rounded cheeks, swallowing, good sucking rhythm, 'ka' sounds meaning that he is taking in and swallowing milk and trying breast compression or if that doesn't work then taking him off and latching him on again when he gets fussy (also winding at this point as fussiness is often him needing to burp whilst still feeding) or starts falling asleep/suckling but not swallowing. I feel sad that we are having to basically go back to basics with our breastfeeding, but very grateful I could call a helpline to get advice and start working on a solution straight away. I also spoke with my health visitor who agreed that it sounded like he wasn't feeding efficiently and suggested we talk it over and see where he is at during our weigh in next week. I have also arranged to drop into the South Wales breastfeeding guru Carole Walton's clinic next week (if you are a breastfeeding mum in this neck of the woods, you will have heard of Carole and her amazing ways of getting ladies to crack biological breastfeeding) to get our latch checked and get some more guidance as to how we can 'fix' this problem and start putting better weight on and feeding more efficiently and properly. Me and my little man are going to get this right, it's a bit of a blow but I'm not going to beat myself up over it, it's a blip yes, but we are just being pro-active in setting it right again and we can do this. We just have some more work to do to get back to being 'breast' friends again.
7. The Daisy Foundation. I started a new mother and baby course to continue getting us out of the house, help develop the little man's learning, and to meet other new mums and babies, that combines baby massage, baby yoga and developmental games and it was really lovely. It's run by the Daisy Foundation and we are doing the Tinies class designed for little babbas and the nice thing is that it's a small class of only 6 other mums and babies and they were all around the same age give or take a week or two.
Pads was a bit grizzly at the start of the first class as it was another new environment and they had laid out cushions for the babies to rest their heads on when lying on the big mat which he was not a fan of, so he was a cry-baby for the first 20 minutes and we had to sit out the start of the massage section. Once we had had a feed and a nappy change and some cuddles, we were able to join in however, and learnt new relaxing massage techniques, with coconut oil, to help relieve colic and reflux. I have since practiced these techniques when we are doing nappy changes at home, just a few gentle massage movements on his tummy and I'd say they have made a difference to help him expel his wind better and making him cry less in the long run.
We also sang some good old baby songs including the all time classic 'wheels on the bus' and a new one for me, 'hello sunshine', incorporating moves whilst holding our babies which was a good way to keep Pads interested and engaged and to make him aware of his movement and rhythm. There was a cute game next designed to help babies recognise their own name, so will let you know if that proves effective in a few weeks. I have been keeping it up at home too so hopefully he will know who he is soon enough! Then we did some stretching moves whilst holding our babies, the 'yoga' portion though it wasn't yoga as I know it, that helps settle them and gives mum some exercise, basically some gentle squats and side to side hip moves and there was even time for a refreshment break and a chat for us mums. I really enjoyed the variety of activities and the thinking behind them and meeting mums with babies around the same age as Pads so am looking forward to the rest of the course. I find it fascinating to discover what babies respond to and why, and what games and activities can help them grow and develop, it's my new area of interest and one that I am keen to delve more into.
8. I don't see nothing wrong, with a little 'pump, and grind. We had a couple of days of it being just me and the little man all day and all of the night whilst Jon was working in London and my mum was away, which is nothing new as we have done this a few times already now, and whilst the first time you are completely alone for more than a day on your own with a baby is scary, it is also reassuring when you get through it and can prove to yourself that you can keep both of you fed, clean and alive on your own. Anyway, I had tried to express a couple of times but Pads would then start crying and need attention or someone would come to the door etc as soon as I was sterilised and set up ready to go, so I kept having to abort my milky mission. I let two days slip without expressing anything as I kept having to tend to Pads instead, but on the 3rd day I was determined not to miss my window again but as usual life, and my baby, continued to make it tricky to find dedicated pump time, so I decided to (wo)man up and multi-task: Baby on one boob, pump on the other. My full Dairy cow transformation is now complete. It was a dexterity test for sure, especially when Pads got all wriggly as usual, with one hand clamping a plastic funnel to my right orb and the other trying to contain a tiny human in the throes of a food 'gasm on the other. No mean feat. I think it should be an Olympic sport as it definitely requires skill, agility and tactical thinking. I hopefully won't have to repeat this double whammy technique too often but where needs must, I now have a solution.
9. I'm spinning around. He did a 180 degree spin around on his baby gym in well under a minute. I had laid him down with his head at the top and went to grab a glass of water, when I turned back around, his feet were where his head had been and he had a smile on his face like he knew he had mastered a new fun skill. This guy is going to keep me on my toes for sure!
10. Massive sleep milestone. He slept in his cot for the first time!!!!!! We only just put it together this week as had expected the Moses basket to be his first bed, but we decided to put the cot up and re-arrange our room to make it fit after finally giving up on the basket as an evening sleeping place and moving it out of our room downstairs into the lounge, where it is now having greater success as an occasional daytime nap bed. (He slept in it for over an hour on Weds - huge news!). Anyway, back to the cot. Jon did his dad duty of putting the cot together (I had already done my pregnant mum duty of painting it a light grey with nursery paint when I was waiting around for Paddington to come out at the end of my pregnancy and I did a pretty good job though patchy in places! Cots are not fun things to paint, all those bloomin' spindles!, as anyone who has had a go will concur!) and placing it next to my side of the bed within arm's reach, then I layered it with the gorgeous blanket my lovely pal Bex made for Pads, lined a few cuddly toys around the sides and his very own Paddington bear standing guard at the foot of the cot, then I put the Sleepyhead in the middle and marvelled at how very grown up the cot looked. I didn't expect anything of it and was just happy to see it up. It felt like a proper nursery now!
We did our usual bedtime routine: bath, little massage, into sleepy suit, side lying feed in bed and he fell asleep next to me. I gave him 10 minutes to make sure he was properly asleep and not in the light r.e.m phase where he easily wakes up if moved, then gently scooped him up and transferred him into his familiar sleepyhead in the cot. He re-adjusted his position as I nervously awaited him awakening. But he didn't! He slept for just over 3 hours straight before waking for his night feed and some cuddles as per usual, then easily went back into the cot for another 3 hour stretch. Amazing. I am proud to say that he has continued to sleep on the sleepyhead in the cot for the rest of the week too, managing over 5 hours straight the 2nd night and a consistent 3.5-4 hours straight on the other nights before wanting a feed, which is exactly as he was doing in the bed with us, if not a little better. Then he has been going back into the cot without any problem for another 1.5-2 hours straight on average. Boom town!
We now have space to sleep and stretch out properly again in our bed without being curled around the edge of his sleepyhead hanging off the edge of the bed, so our sleep is better too. We still do our night feeds lying in bed then it's not far to carry him to the cot, it just has to be done very gently, and after 5am in the morning if he wakes then I'll probably bring him into the bed to try and sleep with me for another hour or so before our morning begins and he wants to be awake, as it's easier than making another transfer to the cot. All round though I am surprised at how readily he has accepted the cot so far, and hoping that it lasts!
I would definitely say that the sleepyhead has made the transition smoother as he is already familiar sleeping in that so for him it isn't a new space we have put him in, it's his usual bed, that smells and feels the same. He can also see me, and I can see him, clearly through the bars and I am right next to him to respond to him as quick as before when he needs me so really, for him, nothing has changed which is why he has taken to it so well so far, but for us, everything has changed as our gorgeous little man is now in his grown up cot, and he looks so tiny and well, like a baby in it love him.
It's been a week of huge highs - sleep, glorious sleep!, big bath time fun - and lousy lows - green poo, dropping off his weight gain chart and breastfeeding worries, but no one ever said parenting was easy and we are not going to get down in the dumps about the lows, we are going to get pro active. Help is always at hand, you may just have to ask for it or seek it out. Next week is going to be all about the breast as we are determined to get our groove back, get his weight up and get those poos back to yellowy brown! (Things I never knew would one day be so important!). Check back next week to see how we got on.
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