Anora: One Month

Anora's one month check up went well. Despite the fact that plans changed at the last minute and I ended up taking all of the kids with me to the appointment. Normally that wouldn't be a big deal if it was a 10 minute drive to the office, but it's a 45 minute drive so we ended up making an afternoon of it. Anyway, that's a later post perhaps.


Stats:
9lb 5oz (50% - I'm not used to an average sized kid at this age)
21 1/2 inches (70%)
37cm HC (50%)

Dr. Macias said that everything looks great. I asked about vitamin D and iron supplements for her and he said I didn't need to start those right now. I let him know that she slept 6 hours a couple of times at night and he said that she's gaining weight just fine and to let her sleep as long as she'd like at night, but continue 3 hour feedings during the day.

Anora has been fairly easy so far. She fell into a sleep, eat, awake routine pretty naturally which is great! She prefers to sleep on her side and she likes to fall asleep with her pacifier, but spits it out when she's almost asleep most of the time.

From day one she was a great eater and I hardly had any latching issues with her. As a result, she went longer between feedings right away (2 1/2 - 3hrs during the day and 3 1/2 - 4 1/2hours at night). That was great EXCEPT it made my engorgement period more difficult and I ended up with Mastitis. NOT FUN! If you don't know what that is, it's a breast infection caused by clogged milk ducts and the symptoms are high fevers, some breast pain (some women have pain while nursing, but I didn't) and flu-like symptoms (body aches, headache, etc.) Once I was on the antibiotic for 24 hours I was 100% better.

Last night (at 5 weeks old) she slept 6 hours (this is her 3rd time doing that) between feedings. Luckily her last feeding was at 9:30pm and I pretty much went to sleep right after I fed her. Yay for a good night's sleep!

Her naps during the day were not the greatest at first, but then we figured out that dairy was making her gassy so I cut down on cheeses and switched to almond milk for awhile. In a couple of weeks I'll slowly bring it back into my diet and see what happens. We also started giving her Gripe Water at night and Mylicon gas drops during the day which seemed to help a lot.

We also figured out that she does not like to be cold. I put her in a onesie, pants, socks, night gown (with little mittens over the hands) a sleepsack AND swaddle her in a blanket at night. Part of that is because I like the room a little cold while I sleep and she still sleeps in the room with us (well, sort of ... she's in our emptied out walk-in closet).

Anora is such a sweet baby. I wouldn't say that she's laid back because she definitely has to speak up if she wants something with two other little boys in house vying for my attention. Half of the time I have to wake her up for her day time feedings and half of the time she wakes up on her own. Usually she fusses herself to sleep and/or I have to put her pacifier back in a zillion times.

She's pretty easy to console when she's upset with the exception of a few times she's woken up almost in a panic in her car seat (I hope she out grows that). Jackson has mastered the "shh-shh-shh" technique, although he thinks if he does it louder it will work better. HA. He's also a HUGE help with her in the car. Micah just thinks the car seat is a toy he can play with.

Anora is smiling more, but it's not predictable or easily coaxed yet. She's also started to make some vocal coos just this week. I LOVE that stage and can't wait for her to verbalize more. I'm sure we will since her awake time during the day is getting longer each day. She's usually awake for about an hour and a half to two hours in her 3 hour feeding schedule.


She handles the attention the boys give her very well. She lets Jackson touch her hands and head without a fuss and he does it a lot. Both boys are pretty good at helping me burp her and they can usually get one out better than I can. Overall nursing her has been easier than Micah because at the time Jackson had no one else to play with and now Micah and Jackson can go off and play with each other while I feed Anora. I LOVE the fact that they play so well together.


Emotionally going from 2 to 3 has been easier than from 1 to 2 so far. Logistically I'm able to handle the scheduling of 2 to 3 better than 1 to 2 AT HOME, but when we go places it's much more difficult going from 2 to 3 than it was 1 to 2. I TRIED to take all three kids to church by myself yesterday ... WHAT WAS I THINKING?!! Next time I need to make sure I ask church family to help me with the boys (especially if I have to feed Anora in the middle of the service).

Overall, Anora has been such a delight! I'm so excited to see what kind of little girl and woman she will become.

Week 4

Week 4

My progress: I'm still bleeding but very lightly and only about every other day or so. Towards the end of the week I went one or two days straight without bleeding at all or at least very little. HOWEVER, if I could go back in time, I would tell myself "DON'T FORGET TO TAKE YOUR STOOL SOFTENER!!!!!!!" I had some TERRIBLE anal fissers this week! If you've never experienced them count yourself LUCKY! Other than that, my physical health is excellent.

I went for a couple walks with the boys this week, including a walk to Walmart and back (about 1 mile or so). I think that has helped begin the process of my pelvic bone shrinking back to its normal size because I've had some pelvic soreness, but I was also able to wear a pair of normal pants (granted they were my bigger normal pants, but at least they don't have the oh so fashionable elastic maternity band on them).

Sleep has been hit and miss this week. It seems like every other night is a good night. On Wednesday night of this past week we had a particularly hard night. Micah was waking up about every two hours and would not finish a full feeding before falling back to sleep. I was EXHAUSTED!!! I remember saying to God around three o'clock in the morning, "LORD I can't do this!! Please give me the strength to so this!! Please show me grace!" (SIGH) Then I remember that there are moms (one in particular comes to mind right now) that would LOVE to be at home with their baby exhausted from nursing them in the middle of the night instead of at a hospital where their baby is fed through an IV.

I think the hardest thing about having a rough night is not being able to catch up on sleep during the day because I have a two year old that had a great night sleep. Colin was wonderful and took Jackson on a lunch date on Thursday so that I could focus on Micah and get some rest. Once I catch up on sleep life seems so much easier!! After one such good night of sleep we were able to go to Babies R Us and the Library (I was pretty proud of myself). But I know that until I get a full night's sleep on a regular basis I STILL NEED A NAP!! I'm looking forward to being able to sleep through the night soon.

Micah: We've got the sleep, eat, awake routine pretty much down this week. For at least one of those cycles during the day he'll sleep through the awake part, but he seems to need that extra sleep. I think he really hit a growth spurt this week. He has a doctor's appointment next week, so I'm anxious to see his progress.

Usually Micah's first daytime feeding is around 6:30am so that we can take Colin to work. Micah nurses every 2 1/2 - 3 1/2 hours right now. So, his feedings have been 6:30, 9:00, 12:00 (which makes lunchtime hard), 3:30, and 6:30. I've tried several times this weeks to wake Micah up for a 9:30 feeding, but he seems to do MUCH better at night when I let him sleep through that feeding. He wakes up on his own around 11:00pm, then 2:30pm and then I try to hold him off until 6:30am, but there have been a couple of times that he's needed to have a quick snack around 5:30 to get him through to the morning.

I've also figured out when is the best time to change him so that I'm not going through a million diapers. I know this seems strange to note, but I think I might find this information useful later. Usually I change him in the middle of nursing. I finish nursing one side, change him (which helps wake him up if he's a little milk drunk) and then nurse the other side. Then I change him right when he shows signs of wanting to sleep, so that he's dry when he falls asleep (I think it helps him sleep longer).

He's been doing much better nursing, but he varies in how long he'll nurse. Sometimes he'll nurse a full ten minutes on both sides and other times he'll nurse ten minutes on one side and not at all on the other side. I've tried not to force it too much because the times that I have pushed it he's just spit up everything I've worked so hard to get him to eat. I've also figured out his cues for needing to burp and as long as I can stay on top that then he'll eat more. It's just that it still seems to take FOREVER. I know he'll get quicker as he gets older.

Micah also has pretty bad baby acne this week. Good thing I got baby portraits already. I'm not doing anything about it, but I might try some Arbonne products that have been known to help if it gets any worse. It bothers me more than it bothers him.

Jackson: came down with what sounded like Croup this week. I think we really nipped it in the bud though by just having a low key week. As soon as I heard that barky cough we started running the humidifier in Jackson's room during his nap and at night time. I also cut his milk intake and substituted it with water/Gatorade to help his cough and keep him hydrated (although we did have a few more potty accidents this week partly from the extra fluids, but he also regressed in this area a little this week (he'd fail to tell me when he had an accident. I let him know that I was not upset that he had an accident, but I was upset that he did not tell me. It seemed to get better after that.)). We also took some DanActive to help boost our immune systems (I think this stuff really works for us). But, Jackson still needed a dose of Ibuprofen for his nap and bed time for a couple of days for his sore throat.

It was hard to keep Jackson from kissing and loving on Micah. I tried to explain to him that when he gets sick it's only a little cough, but if Micah gets sick he would get much sicker because he's so little and the best thing he could do as a big brother is to protect Micah from his sick germs. Jackson did the best he could to keep Micah healthy.

I don't know if it was because he was not feeling well, but Jackson had to be disciplined a lot this week. He disobeys particularly when he knows I'm preoccupied with Micah (especially when I'm nursing). Someone (I can't remember who) said that they have a basket of toys that is designated just for when she nurses. I'm thinking of trying that next week ... we'll see. I'd love to hear other suggestions if you have any. Towards the end of the week Jackson was much better. Perhaps because he was feeling better, but I think it was also due to the consistency in the discipline. I know he misses the one-on-one time he normally gets from me. I've tried to keep his bedtime a time I carve out just for him and that seems to help.