So I've brought 12 babies home from the hospital in the last 15 years, all but one within 18 months of the last one, and yet, there are things I forget and learn with each child.
They eat, they play, they sleep. You do not feed a baby to sleep. You feed them until their "full" light comes on, and then enjoy the happy awake time that follows, even if it happens at 3:30 a.m., for as long as it lasts. Then, when they get sad again after the happy time is over, that's 'tired' and that's when they need to sleep, preferably without nursing again.
Wait for it: the critical need to burp. A crying baby doesn't know why he is crying. He doesn't know why he's sad. He just knows something doesn't feel good. If you offer to nurse him, the good feeling that nursing brings will override whatever was sad, for a while. And a baby that needs to burp will keep eating until he hits *TILT* and then you will wear the top-offs all over your shirt. But I forget this everytime and keep feeding and feeding and feeding.
The hindmilk/foremilk balance. Especially in the above scenario, I have a habit of switching, er, sides everytime a baby nurses again. So I wind up giving a baby lots of foremilk, never get to hindmilk, and that makes for a fussy baby, and sometimes a thrush-y baby.
Thrush=nightmare. It goes like this. I have a baby. People bring food. Lots of food, and lots of desserts. Enough dessert for all 14 people to have 2. Or for all 11 eaters to have one and mom to sneak the other 16 or so servings throughout the day. And my sugar tooth takes over. I am back to my pre-delivery weight and the yeast in my body starts to increase at epic rates. The baby has a yeast infection in the diaper, thrush in his mouth, and I'm in pain. Then I have to (or should) cut out all sugar, white flour and dairy, get a prescription for diflucan, take probiotics, wash with a vinegar/water solution after I nurse, put on the magical motherlove diaper rash thrush cream, and usually wind up painting baby's mouth and my, as sk8 calls it, "nursers, with gentian violet.
Change the diaper, for crying out loud. I have a theory, that God made our poop and pee to stink so we would know to get rid of it and not eat it or keep it on hand. Unfortunately (or sometimes fortunately) my nose doesn't always work. So sometimes my poor baby is crying and I'm nursing and burping and pacifying like I'm getting paid for it and finally it dawns on me to check the diaper and he/she's been sitting in a yucky diaper for a while and my brain just forgot that option.
Too hot to handle? Some of my kids don't like heat. Nuff said.
Babies need sleep, and they need to go to sleep in their beds. If you teach the baby to fall asleep nursing in your arms, they will think that's the only way to get there. You have to put them in bed awake. Exhausted, burped, full of tum and clean of bum, eyes barely open, and let them take it the other 1/10th of the way there. And as soon as they are big enough to sleep longer, somewhere past 11 or 12 lbs, having them a little farther away from my bed means we all sleep better, as they get practice falling back asleep . . . but that only works if they learn to fall asleep on their own.
Anyway. As I'm going through this for the 12th time, and kicking myself in the head remembering these things, I thought I'd write them down. Maybe if I get to have another baby someday, I'll come back and read it and not screw up so bad with the next one.
Showing posts with label thrush. Show all posts
Showing posts with label thrush. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Monday, January 03, 2011
Birth stories, part 2
15 months and 3 weeks later . . .
Booty, spring 1999
My first two children were supposed to be 3 years apart and were really less than 17 months apart, 512 days. So when I found out was pregnant with our third child, I cried. This was not the plan. As I said before, I meant to have 4 children 3 years apart, and instead, I would have 3 children in less than three years. (Around this time I read the book "No Ordinary Home" which I love). But my husband didn't cry, he was pleased.
I was afraid I'd never leave the house again. I researched on-line grocery shopping. I thought life was over. I was, of course, again, wrong.
Since our first son weighed 9 lb 10 oz, we used that as an excuse to deliver early. There was some discrepency about when I was actually due, so I was going with the soonest possible due date, and that helped my cause. Finally, since I had discovered that through nipple stimulation, one could practically induce her own labor, I had big impatience and control issues. Finally, to get me to shut up maybe, my doctor said, when you have some contractions going, come on in, we'll hook you up, break your water, and get you delivered.
Only problem, the baby's head was pretty high. So the nurse actually encouraged me to get out of bed and walk with my labor (what a novel idea). I labored all night while my husband slept. I prayed, sang, and had a great time with God. But I was afraid they were going to send me home. At last, I was really in labor, progressing, and the nurse turned the pit off, thinking my body would take over. Wrong! I was 38 wks 5 days, my body takes 41 weeks to make a baby, and my labor went away. So they turned it back up, and the doc went down the hall for coffee.
I labored a while longer, and got on the bed to be checked. Sure enough, I was ready, and the nurse deliberately did not break my water, knowing the baby was sure to come when she did. So we were waiting for the doctor, the nurse was young and inexperienced, and I told her I wanted to push. She said, "don't you want to wait for the doctor", and I said, "not really. I decided to give just a little push, to relieve the pressure just a little, and whoosh! My water broke and my little 7 lb 5 oz boy swam right out onto the bed (which, thankfully, was still intact). Just me, Dad, the nurse, and our little son, whose name means son of my right hand (funny, because he's a lefty). Within a few minutes we had a whole lot of doctors and nurses in the room, and I'm sure the nurse felt terrible.
Surprises/lessons learned:
You can't really decide when to go into labor all by yourself. The contractions you can induce at home can be painful, but unless you are ready, they won't push a baby out.
Standing up and moving with labor is ever-so-much less painful and more efficient than laying on your back in a bed. It took about 12 hours, but most of that was very managable.
A baby who spends no time in the birth canal is beautiful! No battle marks on this boy.
I was so very surprised to have another son. I figured one son was what you got. In my family there were 3 girls and 1 boy, so I guessed that was what I would have. I remember sitting on my couch watching basketball with my sonS and calling my dad and rubbing it in.
Finally, going from 2 to 3 was not that big of a deal. I used a double stroller and a baby carrier and still went everywhere. I got strange looks, but still had enough of an ego to enjoy that. The bigger two played well together, and we did okay. It was loud and crazy, but I didn't really know any better.
Oh, I also learned not to potty train a toddler right before having a new baby. The last thing a new nursing mom wants to do is stop, put the baby down and run to the bathroom to wipe a bottom, even if it's a cute bottom.
Another side story: I had my worst case of thrush with this kid, and it beat me. We stopped nursing at 5 months. If I knew then what I know now . . . cut out sugar and dairy, take diflucan and power-acidophilus, boil everything, use gentian violet and diaper rash & thrush ointment from cottonbabies.com . . . but I didn't, it got way out of control and I lost.
Booty, spring 1999
My first two children were supposed to be 3 years apart and were really less than 17 months apart, 512 days. So when I found out was pregnant with our third child, I cried. This was not the plan. As I said before, I meant to have 4 children 3 years apart, and instead, I would have 3 children in less than three years. (Around this time I read the book "No Ordinary Home" which I love). But my husband didn't cry, he was pleased.
I was afraid I'd never leave the house again. I researched on-line grocery shopping. I thought life was over. I was, of course, again, wrong.
Since our first son weighed 9 lb 10 oz, we used that as an excuse to deliver early. There was some discrepency about when I was actually due, so I was going with the soonest possible due date, and that helped my cause. Finally, since I had discovered that through nipple stimulation, one could practically induce her own labor, I had big impatience and control issues. Finally, to get me to shut up maybe, my doctor said, when you have some contractions going, come on in, we'll hook you up, break your water, and get you delivered.
Only problem, the baby's head was pretty high. So the nurse actually encouraged me to get out of bed and walk with my labor (what a novel idea). I labored all night while my husband slept. I prayed, sang, and had a great time with God. But I was afraid they were going to send me home. At last, I was really in labor, progressing, and the nurse turned the pit off, thinking my body would take over. Wrong! I was 38 wks 5 days, my body takes 41 weeks to make a baby, and my labor went away. So they turned it back up, and the doc went down the hall for coffee.
I labored a while longer, and got on the bed to be checked. Sure enough, I was ready, and the nurse deliberately did not break my water, knowing the baby was sure to come when she did. So we were waiting for the doctor, the nurse was young and inexperienced, and I told her I wanted to push. She said, "don't you want to wait for the doctor", and I said, "not really. I decided to give just a little push, to relieve the pressure just a little, and whoosh! My water broke and my little 7 lb 5 oz boy swam right out onto the bed (which, thankfully, was still intact). Just me, Dad, the nurse, and our little son, whose name means son of my right hand (funny, because he's a lefty). Within a few minutes we had a whole lot of doctors and nurses in the room, and I'm sure the nurse felt terrible.
Surprises/lessons learned:
You can't really decide when to go into labor all by yourself. The contractions you can induce at home can be painful, but unless you are ready, they won't push a baby out.
Standing up and moving with labor is ever-so-much less painful and more efficient than laying on your back in a bed. It took about 12 hours, but most of that was very managable.
A baby who spends no time in the birth canal is beautiful! No battle marks on this boy.
I was so very surprised to have another son. I figured one son was what you got. In my family there were 3 girls and 1 boy, so I guessed that was what I would have. I remember sitting on my couch watching basketball with my sonS and calling my dad and rubbing it in.
Finally, going from 2 to 3 was not that big of a deal. I used a double stroller and a baby carrier and still went everywhere. I got strange looks, but still had enough of an ego to enjoy that. The bigger two played well together, and we did okay. It was loud and crazy, but I didn't really know any better.
Oh, I also learned not to potty train a toddler right before having a new baby. The last thing a new nursing mom wants to do is stop, put the baby down and run to the bathroom to wipe a bottom, even if it's a cute bottom.
Another side story: I had my worst case of thrush with this kid, and it beat me. We stopped nursing at 5 months. If I knew then what I know now . . . cut out sugar and dairy, take diflucan and power-acidophilus, boil everything, use gentian violet and diaper rash & thrush ointment from cottonbabies.com . . . but I didn't, it got way out of control and I lost.
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