Maniacal Days

Thursday, August 23, 2007

Light Sleeper

**First I'd like to say that you for all your supportive comments on my last post. Any tips and tricks that you found worked for you to deal with the pain of breastfeeding would be greatly appreciated Thanks sooo much gals!**

Now on to Allie, my little light sleeper. I tell you she gets worse and worse at the months go on. The slightest thing will wake her out of a deep sleep crying, and it's getting ridiculous! The poor thing inherited her father's "light sleeping gene" instead of her mother's "can sleep through a bomb hitting the house gene". I swear we tried too. We didn't keep extra quiet or take the phone off the hook or anything like that when she was a baby. Ok, so maybe I didn't hook the speakers in the living room up right next to the pack and play like someone I know (read: my parents) but I swear we didn't do anything different when she was sleeping than we did when she was awake. HOWEVER, now we tend to keep quiet when she's sleeping, cause otherwise she wakes up and we don't want to have to deal with putting her to sleep AGAIN. I guess sometimes nature wins over nurture and here is what we have.....a light sleeper.

Now I live with TWO light sleepers. Mike basically wakes up every time I roll over in bed. I'm sure he's REAL happy to be sleeping in bed with a woman who is 8 months pregnant and not only tosses and turns all night WITH her body pillow but also goes to the bathroom 3 - 4 times a night. But he suffers silently so *shrug*.

Basically we have a 2 year old light sleeper on our hands, and a baby due to make his appearance in about 3 weeks. Now I'm already practically waking Allie up from creaking the floor on my trips to the bathroom in the middle of the night. I'm not kidding, I already tip toe there being conscience of the creaky spots and have stopped flushing the toilet and still she stirs and makes noise on almost every trip I make to the potty. So NO WAY IN HELL she's gonna sleep through the baby waking up every 2 - 3 (oh please GOD make it 3) hours screaming to eat. Let alone the fact that I didn't forget that babies (especially newborns) WAIL the entire time your changing their diaper in the middle of the night. What I'm saying is that I'm petrified that not only are we going to be up with Luke every 2 - 3 (please 3) hours, but we will ALSO be up with Allie.

And being up with Allie is gonna be MUCH harder than being up with Luke. Cause Allie isn't going to be able to be nursed back to sleep. She's gonna be cranky and tantruming and worst of all wanting to go back to sleep in mommy and daddy's bed for payback that a small baby woke her up.

What's gonna end up happening is I'll be getting up with Luke (due to the breastfeeding) and Mike will be getting up with Allie (due to the fact that she's attached at the hip with him). Now don't get me wrong, Mike is a loving wonderful and incredible helpful husband, but I must say he gets a bit cranky when he is up all night with a cranky toddler and then has to wake up and go to work the next day. So THAT'S gonna be fun.

Someone tell me that this happened to them and that Allie is gonna "get over" this whole light sleeper thing and get used to crying in the middle of the night in like a week or two. right? someone? please?

Labels: Althea Raye, Oh baby

Posted by Jenn :: 8:42 PM :: # 10 comments

Monday, August 20, 2007

Are boobs in or out?

I breastfed Althea for 3 weeks. It was a very hormonal emotional night time feeding where she was crying because she was hungry and I was crying because I was in so much pain I didn't want to feed her. My husband, who has only saw me cry maybe once or twice before that, had no idea what to do. He never saw me in pain like that, and was ready to talk me into whatever would stop me from crying. (remember I had a c-section so he never witnessed labor)

I called my mother, who went through hell to breastfeed me, and asked her what I should do. I went through all the reasons I could think of why maybe breastfeeding wasn't for me. After all, at 8 weeks I was going back to a job where I worked full time, and where if I needed to pump it would be in the bathroom. Maybe this whole thing just wasn't for me. She told me that she breastfed me because it was easy for her. She didn't have to worry about bottles or formula or sterilizing. It was just her and me, and that's all she needed. Then she said, maybe if it's not going to be easy it's not for you.

I walked into the dining room and went through a bag of "Emergency Items" one of my friends brought and pulled out the can of formula. It was the kind where all you had to do was pour it in the bottle. I sterilized the bottle, poured the formula in it, and fed it to my screaming child. I felt like I was doing something illegal. Shockingly and luckily Allie didn't care in the slightest. She didn't mind the taste, she didn't mind the nipple, and she didn't mind that it wasn't me. She just drank it down. While feeding her I sent my husband to my girlfriend's house to pick up a breast pump.

From that night till 8 weeks when I went back to work I pumped. I fed Allie some formula and some breast milk until I was totally dried up. I had a slight case of malatosis a couple of days before going back to work and that was the end. Allie took to the formula great and I never looked back.

Ok, that's a lie. I looked back a million times. Every time she got sick I beat myself up. When they told me she was slightly anemic I blamed myself. Why couldn't I hack it? How is it that woman do this all the time, and I could find a little strength to pull through a painful feeding or two? I made it through 2 tattoos, one that was 2 hours long. I made it through a belly button piercing that killed! Why was this so damn hard?

This was not really where I wanted this post to go. I wanted to talk about now. This time around I'm going to have a much longer maternity leave. This time I want to try breastfeeding again. And this time I want it to work. I thought about why it was so hard. You take the most hormonal, emotional, and sleep deprived time of your life and add in pain you can't do anything about, and a being that is practically poking at your wound with no holding back and you get an emotional breakdown. This time I know it coming, and I know why. Maybe that will help?

I've also been looking for some support. For starters I'm not going to brush off the nurse at the hospital when she offered to help me, like last time, with the stupid first time mother statement of: No thanks, I know what I'm doing. I'm going to seek out the lactation consultant and use the 4 days that I'm in the hospital to learn as much as I possibly can from her...and maybe get her cell phone number!

Unfortunately, that's pretty much the extent of my support. I've talked to the couple of people that I know who have kids and shockingly almost ALL of them went the formula route. In fact, when I told them that I breastfed Allie (albeit for a short time) and that I was planning on doing it again they all gave me looks like......WHY?!?!? I got comments like:
"Ugh, all that time that your body is not yours...why extend it?"
"Doesn't it hurt?"
"Gee, so when ARE you going to be able to drink again??"
"It's not like it's THAT much easier than bottles, I don't see the advantage"
"Yea, I have a friend like that. She actually breastfed her daughter till she was three. GROSS!"
"So your going to have to do ALL the night feedings? wow!"

And here I thought that breastfeeding was back in again....not according to the people around me. Anyone out there have anything positive to say? Advice maybe?

Labels: Oh baby, Preggo Blues

Posted by Jenn :: 8:20 PM :: # 19 comments

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

A Small Sigh of Relief

Well, Hi there!! Wait, is anyone left out there? *shrug* Oh well, either way doesn't matter. My head has been BUSTING with things I need to write down to get out of my head and no time or energy to write them down. It's horrible and reminds me of why I started this blog in the first place; to get all that crap out of my head so I can sleep! I have to say thank goodness for the girls on my pregnancy board (we're still together from Allie) cause at least I still have a chance to bother them with all this crap with a quick "Woe is Me" email. If not for that I would have exploded by now. I mean sheesh even my husband, who's not a huge fan of blogging posts more than me these days.

Anyway, I'm home! I am officially on maternity and I feel a million times better. It may not be easier as I'm home taking care of a two year old, but mentally it's a world of difference. A sense of calm has washed over me now that I don't have to deal with the office and the people there. I can now focus on what's important to me and what is currently taking over my every day. It's been so hard to attempt and put this pregnancy and my relationship with both Allie and my husband on the back burner and pretend like the bullshit that is going on at work actually matters to me more. Cause it doesn't. Not even close. Truthfully, I'm not sure what's going to happen as far as going back to work but if I never have to deal with that again, I'd be a happy happy woman.

As Mike and I were talking about in our post on Dad said Mom said this week, Mike has been picking up a lot of my slack with both Allie and doing things around the house. With the sciatic pain and just the sheer size of me lately, I'm done and ready for the couch after attempting to move all day long. Now that I am home I am doing a little more, but I'm not sure if Mike is getting much benefit from it, cause I'm still ready for the couch the second he walks in the door. Although, maybe I at least thought about dinner, possibly did a load of laundry, and potentially emptied the dish washer. Hey it's better than nothing!

As far as the relationship with my daughter I'm home with her now, and hopefully I can spend some quality time with her before the baby gets here. She still asks about 15 times a day "Daddy's workin??", but I'm the one here with her all day and it makes me feel better that it's not all daddy all the time. Allie has been sick these past two days with a fever so we are kinda stuck in the house but as soon as she's better we can at least go to the park or the lake (two things that don't require much physical activity from me) and get some of that much needed quality time in.

Of course, finishing the nursery wouldn't be a bad idea either. LOL

Labels: It's all about me, Oh baby

Posted by Jenn :: 1:25 PM :: # 5 comments