March 22, 2006
Looking Back at Peter's Sixth Week
It's our sixth week together, and we've got something of a daily rhythm. It's not a precise schedule, but I'll take it.
Morning
Tom wakes me with a good-bye kiss. Before heading to work, he stands over the cradle, watching Peter say good morning with his smiles, gooh's and gah's. Unable to resist this cheerful wake-up call, I pull the baby in bed with me to nurse. Sunrise has never been so divine.
Afterward we head to the nursery (i.e., laundry closet turned Bunnykins) where I change Peter on the dryer. As a baby-clothes aficionado, choosing his outfit is one of my favorite events of the day.
Now to the living room couch, where I place Peter in the corner, and we smile. We smile and we goo and we gah and we smile some more. I walk back and forth between Peter and the kitchen and bring back my cheese toast and apple, then smile and goo and gah some more while I eat. All this activity wears the little man out, and into the bouncy seat he goes for a catnap while I shower.
The rest of the morning varies. Either he naps in the car as I run errands around town, or he naps in his stroller as I run errands in the nearby village on foot.
Afternoon
Mommy time! Unlike the short, scattered naps of the morning, with much nursing in between, Peter takes a solid 3-4 hour nap in the afternoon. This is when I get things done, from house chores to personal pleasures like reading.
It's also when I watch Days of our Lives. I swore that when I was a stay-at-home mom I woudn't watch it more than once a week, yet another principle I've thrown out the window. I'm one step away from sweatsuits and bon bons. To make myself feel less guilty, I'll often do something productive like ironing while I watch.
By the end of Peter's nap, I am re-invigorated and miss my little boy. I rush eagerly to nurse him when he wakes.
Evening-- the Witching Hour
Good thing Peter's nap renews me so much, or I don't know how I'd get through the next few hours.
After his first feeding, Peter is pleasant. We play the smiling game. Soon, though, begin bursts of fussiness. "I don't just want to be held, Mama," he says with his choppy squeals. "I want to be walked around or rocked or have you hold the pacifier in my mouth." This is when it would be nice if he'd let me wear him in the sling, something I try every day in hopes that he'll decide he likes it. (Update: I later learned our pouch was way too small for him and me both.)
At least Peter can be consoled. He responds to soothing methods for as long as we continue them. In fact, he'll even smile between bouts of fussing. Every now and then, he is willing to sit in the bouncy seat for thirty minutes listening to lullabies.
When Tom walks in the door, he eagerly takes the baby, much to my relief. While daddy and baby play, I prepare supper, glad for some time to myself. We're still enjoying meals from friends, so really all I have to do is pop something in the oven.
Supper can be exasperating, since Peter's not wild about his bouncy seat. Tom and I take turns replacing his pacifier, sometimes several times in one minute. It can take a long time to eat this way.
Then Tom and I take turns soothing the baby as we watch television or read. A couple hours more of alternating between frustration, laughter, and relief according to Peter's fussing, smiles, and catnaps.
Night
Now that Peter goes to sleep within half an hour of being laid down, I don't dread the night.
His cradle is pulled up to my side of the bed. He doesn't actually sleep in it, though. He sleeps in his car seat which is inside of the cradle. He's decided nothing beats a car seat for sleeping, which works out well for us both since that puts us on the same level. I can pick him up for feedings without having to lean down or get out of bed.
With him so easily brought into bed for feedings, nursing him in the middle of the night isn't so bad. He wakes up twice, and I breasfeed him lying down. Both of us doze through it. I put him back in the cradle/carseat, and he's usually back to sleep in minutes, if not instantly. The whole thing is so uneventful that I'm refreshed in the morning and don't have to nap when he does.
When the sun comes up, we do it all over again.
Showing posts with label newborn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label newborn. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Babymoon (Wk 5: NEWBORN DAZE)
March 22, 2006
Looking Back at Peter's Fifth Week
Tom's touch on my thigh awakens me. He stands dressed for work beside our bed. The cradle is pulled up next to me, and Tom nods his head at it for me to see Peter grinning and cooing at him. It wasn't his first grin, but it was the first in his new routine of greeting us each day with smiles.
That first tender morning, one of those moments that I will return to in my mind until the day I die, I looked at the pacifier on my bedside table and remembered when a thermometer had been there instead. Our efforts to conceive had been fulfilled, and the honeymoon had finally begun.
Mother & Child
After a month of surviving motherhood, at last I began to enjoy it.
Until that point, my love for Peter produced only stress as I tried fretfully to meet his needs for food and sleep. There was little time for introspection. With the necessities in better order, though, I could spend vast amounts of time dwelling on the dimple in his chin.
Finally his constant activity was a source of joy rather than consternation. I listened intently to his goo's and ga's. I watched with pride at his wiggling, his slicing the air with his arms and forever kicking those long skinny legs. And that smile-- oh, that smile!
I say that as if there were only one smile, but Peter has many. Anytime he smiles, it's an energetic affair. He opens his mouth long, then spreads it wide, then opens and closes his lips, all the while undulating his head like Stevie Wonder.
And those sounds he makes while nursing! He grunts and growls and punches a tiny fist in my breast, then his eyes roll back as he settles in to nurse contentedly.
It is all I had hoped.
Father & Child
Greater than I had hoped has been watching Tom in his new role. Throughout the pregnancy, we'd both been a little nervous and excited about what was to come. He was nervous, I was excited. When Peter was born, we traded. A few days after Peter's birth, Tom cozied up next to me in the narrow hospital bed and said, "Isn't this the best that life has ever been?"
As I struggled in pain that week, zapped by the c-section, he relished caring for the baby. He was an expert swaddler after one lesson, burped Peter like a pro, and became the family photographer.
Seeing him take Peter's pictures to work, cheerfully learn how to fasten a cloth diaper, and pridefully push the stroller around the neighborhood has been almost as great a joy as becoming a mother.
That's not all. He's a better husband. Well, maybe that's not the best way to put it, but I'm getting to see new sides to him. I mean, not only was he willing to go to the nurses' station and ask for extra disposable panties after my c-section, but he was the one to dry me off and dress me after my first shower, when I could still hardly move.
He was my encourager when I felt inadequate as a mother, my comfort through Peter's sleeping issues. It's been a long time since I let anyone take care of me. It feels good.
Looking Back at Peter's Fifth Week
Tom's touch on my thigh awakens me. He stands dressed for work beside our bed. The cradle is pulled up next to me, and Tom nods his head at it for me to see Peter grinning and cooing at him. It wasn't his first grin, but it was the first in his new routine of greeting us each day with smiles.
That first tender morning, one of those moments that I will return to in my mind until the day I die, I looked at the pacifier on my bedside table and remembered when a thermometer had been there instead. Our efforts to conceive had been fulfilled, and the honeymoon had finally begun.
Mother & Child
After a month of surviving motherhood, at last I began to enjoy it.
Until that point, my love for Peter produced only stress as I tried fretfully to meet his needs for food and sleep. There was little time for introspection. With the necessities in better order, though, I could spend vast amounts of time dwelling on the dimple in his chin.
Finally his constant activity was a source of joy rather than consternation. I listened intently to his goo's and ga's. I watched with pride at his wiggling, his slicing the air with his arms and forever kicking those long skinny legs. And that smile-- oh, that smile!
I say that as if there were only one smile, but Peter has many. Anytime he smiles, it's an energetic affair. He opens his mouth long, then spreads it wide, then opens and closes his lips, all the while undulating his head like Stevie Wonder.
And those sounds he makes while nursing! He grunts and growls and punches a tiny fist in my breast, then his eyes roll back as he settles in to nurse contentedly.
It is all I had hoped.
Father & Child
Greater than I had hoped has been watching Tom in his new role. Throughout the pregnancy, we'd both been a little nervous and excited about what was to come. He was nervous, I was excited. When Peter was born, we traded. A few days after Peter's birth, Tom cozied up next to me in the narrow hospital bed and said, "Isn't this the best that life has ever been?"
As I struggled in pain that week, zapped by the c-section, he relished caring for the baby. He was an expert swaddler after one lesson, burped Peter like a pro, and became the family photographer.
Seeing him take Peter's pictures to work, cheerfully learn how to fasten a cloth diaper, and pridefully push the stroller around the neighborhood has been almost as great a joy as becoming a mother.
That's not all. He's a better husband. Well, maybe that's not the best way to put it, but I'm getting to see new sides to him. I mean, not only was he willing to go to the nurses' station and ask for extra disposable panties after my c-section, but he was the one to dry me off and dress me after my first shower, when I could still hardly move.
He was my encourager when I felt inadequate as a mother, my comfort through Peter's sleeping issues. It's been a long time since I let anyone take care of me. It feels good.
Reality Bites (Wk 1: NEWBORN DAZE)
March 22, 2006
Looking Back at Peter's First Week
In my birth fantasy, I labored at home then popped into the hospital just in time to push. After my med-free delivery, the baby remained in my room, never to see the nursery. The next day we'd bring home our exclusively breastfed, uncircumcised baby who effortlessly slept 16 hours a day.
An induced, 31-hour labor followed by a c-section wasn't in the picture. Nor was waiting several hours before attempting to breastfeed, not because of hospital policy but because all I could think about was sleeping for the first time in two days. Nor was watching everyone but me hold the baby for the next two days, as I was in too much pain to do much more than hold Peter in a football clutch to feed him.
What else wasn't in the picture?
Got Milk?
Both the lactation consultant and in-house pediatrician told me to nurse frequently and don't supplement to hasten the arrival of my milk. That is, until Peter's third day in the hospital, when he became inconsolable even with hourly "feedings," quit producing dirty or wet diapers, and had peeling lips. He had lost well over a pound and was becoming dehydrated.
On day four, with no sign of my milk, the pediatrician had us supplement Peter's feedings (while continuing to nurse) until he produced a wet diaper. Demoralized as I felt, watching him gnaw his fist in hunger was too much for me not to follow orders.
As I lamented my inability to feed my newborn like women have done for thousands of years, one nurse told me she sees it all the time with the c-section moms. "You don't hear about women in developing countries with milk problems, but they're not having c-sections." For an almost 10-pound boy born ready for a steak dinner, the colostrum of his c-sectioned, first-time mother was leaving him hanging.
When did my milk come in? I'm still not sure. I never became engorged, never felt full or heavy, never had any of those textbook signs...
The pediatrician, though, ordered me to quit supplementing as soon as that wet diaper came through, less than 24 hours after we started. She assured me that my colostrum would increase until my milk came in. Sometime since then, without ceremony, it has surreptiously arrived.
My Friends, the Nurses
Even aside from the feeding fiasco, my feelings of ineptitude surged.
I've learned dead languages in their original alphabets. So I can learn how to swaddle a baby, right? Wrong. Each time I saw a new nurse, I'd have her give me a lesson, not letting on that a nurse from a previous shift had already shown me. Then she'd leave the room, I'd try it again on my own, and Peter would kick his way out.
Every sneeze, every hiccup, every fuss Peter made had me frantically unsure of myself. I started calling the nursery for advice. Next thing you know, I was asking them to take the baby so I could have a one-hour catnap. Then another. Within a couple of days, I was sending Peter for overnight visits to his new aunts in the nursery. They still brought him back every two hours for me to feed him.
When discussing discharge dates with the doctor, Tom and I opted to take a fifth day in the hospital. I just wasn't ready to go it alone yet.
Snip, Snip
Given how everything else played out, I guess it's only fitting that my last remaining principle was out the door too.
Months earlier, my husband and I had discussed circumcision. Tom had said there was no compelling medical reason to do it, and that he'd probably opt against it if we had a son. His saying that gave me the generosity to say, "I'll let you make the final call on that one."
Well, Tom still says there's no medical reason to do it. But we did, based on the whole like-father, like-son argument. It was done by a pediatrician using local anesthetic.
Reality Bites
So much for the fantasies. My first week of motherhood wasn't the love fest I'd imagined. It was survival. I lived the week in a fog, vulnerable to the whims of everyone around me.
When I (reluctantly) left the hospital, I told myself that one week later-- certainly within two weeks-- I'd have things under control enough for me to start enjoying my new role.
Ha.
Looking Back at Peter's First Week
In my birth fantasy, I labored at home then popped into the hospital just in time to push. After my med-free delivery, the baby remained in my room, never to see the nursery. The next day we'd bring home our exclusively breastfed, uncircumcised baby who effortlessly slept 16 hours a day.
An induced, 31-hour labor followed by a c-section wasn't in the picture. Nor was waiting several hours before attempting to breastfeed, not because of hospital policy but because all I could think about was sleeping for the first time in two days. Nor was watching everyone but me hold the baby for the next two days, as I was in too much pain to do much more than hold Peter in a football clutch to feed him.
What else wasn't in the picture?
Got Milk?
Both the lactation consultant and in-house pediatrician told me to nurse frequently and don't supplement to hasten the arrival of my milk. That is, until Peter's third day in the hospital, when he became inconsolable even with hourly "feedings," quit producing dirty or wet diapers, and had peeling lips. He had lost well over a pound and was becoming dehydrated.
On day four, with no sign of my milk, the pediatrician had us supplement Peter's feedings (while continuing to nurse) until he produced a wet diaper. Demoralized as I felt, watching him gnaw his fist in hunger was too much for me not to follow orders.
As I lamented my inability to feed my newborn like women have done for thousands of years, one nurse told me she sees it all the time with the c-section moms. "You don't hear about women in developing countries with milk problems, but they're not having c-sections." For an almost 10-pound boy born ready for a steak dinner, the colostrum of his c-sectioned, first-time mother was leaving him hanging.
When did my milk come in? I'm still not sure. I never became engorged, never felt full or heavy, never had any of those textbook signs...
The pediatrician, though, ordered me to quit supplementing as soon as that wet diaper came through, less than 24 hours after we started. She assured me that my colostrum would increase until my milk came in. Sometime since then, without ceremony, it has surreptiously arrived.
My Friends, the Nurses
Even aside from the feeding fiasco, my feelings of ineptitude surged.
I've learned dead languages in their original alphabets. So I can learn how to swaddle a baby, right? Wrong. Each time I saw a new nurse, I'd have her give me a lesson, not letting on that a nurse from a previous shift had already shown me. Then she'd leave the room, I'd try it again on my own, and Peter would kick his way out.
Every sneeze, every hiccup, every fuss Peter made had me frantically unsure of myself. I started calling the nursery for advice. Next thing you know, I was asking them to take the baby so I could have a one-hour catnap. Then another. Within a couple of days, I was sending Peter for overnight visits to his new aunts in the nursery. They still brought him back every two hours for me to feed him.
When discussing discharge dates with the doctor, Tom and I opted to take a fifth day in the hospital. I just wasn't ready to go it alone yet.
Snip, Snip
Given how everything else played out, I guess it's only fitting that my last remaining principle was out the door too.
Months earlier, my husband and I had discussed circumcision. Tom had said there was no compelling medical reason to do it, and that he'd probably opt against it if we had a son. His saying that gave me the generosity to say, "I'll let you make the final call on that one."
Well, Tom still says there's no medical reason to do it. But we did, based on the whole like-father, like-son argument. It was done by a pediatrician using local anesthetic.
Reality Bites
So much for the fantasies. My first week of motherhood wasn't the love fest I'd imagined. It was survival. I lived the week in a fog, vulnerable to the whims of everyone around me.
When I (reluctantly) left the hospital, I told myself that one week later-- certainly within two weeks-- I'd have things under control enough for me to start enjoying my new role.
Ha.
Our First Few Weeks (NEWBORN DAZE)
February 26, 2006
My newborn doesn't sleep.
Everyone told me this would be the easy time when you change him, feed him, and put him back to sleep in a neverending cycle in which the baby sleeps 14-22 hours.
Well, Peter would be happy to sleep 22 hours-- if it were in my arms. Instead, our cycle goes change him, feed him, put him down to sleep, and pick him up within 10 minutes because he is wailing.
I've tried changing his sleeping venue, warming his sheets, putting him down asleep, putting him down awake, feeding him longer, rocking him, swaddling him, not swaddling him, using the pacifier, not using the pacifier, and every combination of the above. (Update: If I had known then what I know now about how to wear my baby and safely sleep with him, you wouldn't be reading this...)
These few weeks have been the most challenging of my life. Most things until now I've felt I could accomplish with enough study or practice. This, on the other hand, is beyond intellectual or physical determination. It breaks my heart that the one thing in life I have not been able to "accomplish" involves the little boy I love so much. I just want to give him the basics: food, warmth, SLEEP.
Not to mention that Mama needs some rest too. She also needs to eat and get dressed and unload the dishwasher now and then. These things aren't happening.
So right now I'm in survival mode. I'm taking help from family and friends and seeking the advice of pediatricians. I have lowered my standards on things like whether or not my teeth get brushed. And I'm grateful that I cleared my calendar before the baby arrived.
What this does mean is that I'll need to take a little hiatus from keeping this journal. I plan to take off the month of March and return in April, hopefully with these sleep issues worked out.
My newborn doesn't sleep.
Everyone told me this would be the easy time when you change him, feed him, and put him back to sleep in a neverending cycle in which the baby sleeps 14-22 hours.
Well, Peter would be happy to sleep 22 hours-- if it were in my arms. Instead, our cycle goes change him, feed him, put him down to sleep, and pick him up within 10 minutes because he is wailing.
I've tried changing his sleeping venue, warming his sheets, putting him down asleep, putting him down awake, feeding him longer, rocking him, swaddling him, not swaddling him, using the pacifier, not using the pacifier, and every combination of the above. (Update: If I had known then what I know now about how to wear my baby and safely sleep with him, you wouldn't be reading this...)
These few weeks have been the most challenging of my life. Most things until now I've felt I could accomplish with enough study or practice. This, on the other hand, is beyond intellectual or physical determination. It breaks my heart that the one thing in life I have not been able to "accomplish" involves the little boy I love so much. I just want to give him the basics: food, warmth, SLEEP.
Not to mention that Mama needs some rest too. She also needs to eat and get dressed and unload the dishwasher now and then. These things aren't happening.
So right now I'm in survival mode. I'm taking help from family and friends and seeking the advice of pediatricians. I have lowered my standards on things like whether or not my teeth get brushed. And I'm grateful that I cleared my calendar before the baby arrived.
What this does mean is that I'll need to take a little hiatus from keeping this journal. I plan to take off the month of March and return in April, hopefully with these sleep issues worked out.
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